Ordination of Jim Fleming to Diaconate in St. John's NL

Jim Fleming was ordained last night in St. John’s at Mary Queen of Peace Church on Torbay Road. There was a large turnout, similar to a Sunday Mass, plus around 30 priests. I attended with a contingent from our Catholic Young Adults of Newfoundland group. Jim is now a transitional deacon and he mentioned officially he is called “Reverend Dr. James Fleming” although I’m sure he’d rather be just called Jim.

 

In around one year from now he will ordained to the priesthood. Presiding last night was the archbishop of St. John’s Martin Currie. There was a full choir and Sara Broderick did much of the cantering. She did a great job. Afterwards there was a reception to celebrate the ordination. Jim said it was great to see everyone from CYAN there. He’s a genuinely good guy and very intelligent. Before entering the seminary, Jim had acquired a PhD in organic chemistry and had a very impressive academic career. But he decided to pursue a higher calling.

 

Congratulations Jim on your ordination and good luck with everything!

Another Day of Absurdity in the World of Feminism

In a desperate attempt to add meaning to their lives, a group of girls at Beaconsfield Junior High in St. John’s, Newfoundland school called are protesting a school dress code which they say creates a different standard for girls and boys. Wait, but girls and boys ARE different, aren’t they? OOPS, what I meant to say is gender is just a patriarchal construct which is completely subjective and only enforces rape culture because the patriarchy like to rape the matriarchy…? I’m sorry I just don’t know how to talk Womenstudian properly.

 

In the typical feminazi way, these girls are complaining that men do have the same dress code restrictions as they do. Apparently men can wear shorter skirts than the girls, and that’s just not going to fly! They also seem to be complaining that men can wear tank tops. What self-respected guy is wearing a tanktop anyway?

 

First of all, are these girls delusional? Do they really believe boys and girls are the same? I thought they used to teach biology or at least “family studies” or whatever they call that stupid subject these days. Clearly boys and girls are different physically. Wait, is that sexist to say? Never mind, it’s too hard to keep track of. So boys and girls are different, we all know that. Only feminazis would ever even challenge that idea.

 

But secondly, guys and girls are different in how they understand and see sexuality. Men are very visual creatures. Women who wear sexually revealing clothing draw the attention of men, and unfortunately the women can end up becoming sexual objects to the men. Take however many women’s studies classes that you want this is the reality of it. This just isn’t the same for women. I’m not saying it’s 0% true for women. On many levels women probably do appreciate a man who is in good physical shape, but it’s a much different situation. There’s a reason why on a hot summer day most people would not be shocked to see a man without his shirt on, but a woman without her shirt on would cause a scandal. This is a cross-cultural reality that developed over thousands of years. It’s not as if one day all men or some leaders got together to decide this will be our view of sexuality.

 

One girl said she should not be sexualized. But who is sexualizing whom? If she insists on wearing short skirts and tank tops, is it a boy’s fault for looking at her, and can she honestly say she is not seeking attention of a sexual nature? Even if she isn’t, she should at least understand how sexuality works because she seems oblivious.

 

Instead of pursuing something as nonsensical and meaningless as this, maybe these girls should focus on doing well academically. How much money have we been forced to waste on “women’s studies” which as far as I can tell have produced no benefits for society whatsoever. Engineering has promoted women’s freedom more than any women’s studies class. How? By creating things like the washing machine and dishwasher, saving women hundreds of hours per year to pursue other activities. That’s the reality.

 

One of the main problems is our monolithic school board where people don’t have a choice where to go. Schools should be private properties and the owners allowed to make whatever rules they want. If the customers (students and parents would be customers) didn’t like the rules they would go elsewhere. Schools would cater to the specific desires of parents and students in order to have the largest customer base.

 

But alas, we don’t live in such a world. We live in a world where a small group of bureaucrats like to socially engineer our culture.

 

Also a note on “rape culture”. First of all it doesn’t exist. Rape culture is one of those concepts which implicitly admits that rape is no longer an issue and in a desperate attempt to find meaning, like the girl/s in this story, we use another term. The new term is far more vague but the good news is that evidence for it is much more readily available. It would be like saying there is a “murder culture” and using as evidence the fact that people are killed in movies or that someone insulted you. It may not be outright murder, but it all contributes to the “culture” of murder. It’s absolute nonsense, but people love to have something to live for.

 

This whole incident is just complete absurdity, and is being used by the people involved to make themselves feel like justice warriors. My suggestion is they do something useful with their lives.

 

 

Islamic Extremist's Shoots Himself Instead of Churchgoers

A 24-year old Islamic terrorist who was a computer science student accidentally shot himself in the leg as he was on his way to kill people at a church in Paris, France. Perhaps this was divine intervention.

 

This is just one more in a long line of terrorist attacks which have recently taken place in France. The most deadly was the attack on a newspaper that dared publish pictures of Mohammed wherein 12 people were slaughtered.

 

In light of these issues it’s important to look at the reality of what is going on – putting aside how we want things to be and rather look at things objectively. So what is the truth?

 

The first question is “are all religions the same?” The affirmative answer to this question is something you hear frequently. Islam is the same as every other religion, it’s just certain extremists misinterpret the religion and use it for violent purposes. If that were the case, why are we seeing thousands of Muslim terrorist attacks but virtually no Hindu or Buddhist terrorist attacks?

 

In an interesting video I saw recently, it was noted that many people in Islamic countries believe in the imposition of Sharia law, a law which prescribes cutting off hands for stealing and beheading for a variety of other crimes. It advocates stoning to death for adulterers. Many Muslims believe that insulting their religion is a form of attack and the only proper response is to violently attack people who criticize the religion or their prophet. These are not extremist positions, but commonly held views among Muslims.

 

Another interesting video I saw showed for how long and to what degree Islamic groups have been at war with the West. Over the years, they have slaughtered thousands of people and initiated hundreds of battles and wars. These started as soon as Islam started. The Islamic armies conquered vast Christian areas, forcing them into submission. All of North Africa, for example, used to be Christian but was forcibly converted to Islam. We all know about the “choices” people faced – conversion, death, or a debilitating tax and second-class status in society.

 

The idea that Islamic terrorism these days is the result of grievances about particular battles or actions by the West is absurd. In fact, the terrorists themselves don’t cite these things as reasons, so why should we? Most of the terrorists from the West actually come from well-to-do families in well-off parts of town. Many have never even been to the Islamic world. Yet they become killers.

 

So what is the solution? For one thing, the only person who can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. When a psychopath like this guy goes to a church to kill a bunch of people none of your laws will work to stop him. The only thing that would work is meeting him with equal force – not to become sitting ducks. Guns are already banned for personal use in France, but people determined enough find a way to gain access to a firearm will do so. Then is everyone else supposed to sit there waiting to be the next victim.

 

We need to be realistic about Islam and its motives. We can make excuses till the cows come home, but eventually we have to realize that Islam is fundamentally more violent and has a different perspective on when force is warranted. Pretending this is not true is absurd. Once we realize these things, a screening process needs to be put in place to filter out extremists. I’m not sure how such a system could be initiated, but it’s necessary.

 

Secondly, people must be armed with both knowledge and arms. Knowledge is perhaps the most important thing – the ability to spot trouble behavior, people behaving in threatening ways and being able to intervene before something serious happens. Specifically this applies to airport workers. Our system is really stupid. People are chosen at random to be searched. It could be an 85 year old grandmother or a terrorist from Yemen. Both would have an equal chance of being looked at more closely. In Israel, they use a different system whereby they spot suspicious behaviors, body language, and other things. They don’t just randomly pick people. Also, everyday citizens must inform themselves of how to be safe in various situations.

 

In terms of arms, as I said only a good guy with a gun can stop a bad guy with a gun. Look up John Lott for more information on this topic. He has researched the information and found that violence always increases when guns are banned because essentially the criminals find criminal ways to obtain guns, but the general public is left helpless. The cities in the US with the strictest gun control laws have the highest gun crime rates. Also, after the bans were initiated, violence increased more in those cities than elsewhere. It may seem counterintuitive, but it makes sense when you think about it a little.

 

Islam is not the same as every other religion. The vast majority of Muslims would never commit a terrorist attack, but we have to be aware of the threat and prepare ourselves. Most importantly, we must pray for Muslims that they convert to Christianity so they will chose to love their enemy and forgive those who persecute them rather than attack them.

 

Article here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/paris-extremist-s-misfire-thwarts-imminent-attack-on-church-1.3043405

Telling the Truth is Anti-Gay

So Russ Kuykendall was going to run for the Wild Rose Party in Alberta, Canada in the Calgary-Varsity riding for the provincial election. About 8 years ago he wrote an article stating he was unhappy about a gay pride brunch being held in a Catholic church, almost certainly against the will of the church.

 

In his blog, he wrote: "The message that appears to be sent to Catholic Christians who don't accept this 'lifestyle' as acceptable is that 'equality' means that gay activists can take their agenda not just to your front door, but inside the door to places that are consecrated to the Catholic faith."

 

There is nothing offensive in this comment unless the truth is offensive. A gay pride group forcibly held a meeting on the premises of a group that is morally opposed to the actions the gay pride group condones, forcing the church to act against its will and to violate its moral convictions. Kuykendall is just pointing out his opposition to this. But because he is unhappy about it, it’s of course “anti-gay”. Ah yes, the popular catch-all phrase which allows people to bypass that pesky thing called the truth and silence anyone who opposes them!

 

So anyway, because of his non-hateful comments, Kuykendall is banned from running for the Wild Rose Party. I don’t have any issue with this in principle. A party should be able to accept or reject any members it wants. The problem is people’s knee-jerk reaction to things like this to call them “anti-gay”. It’s like if someone published a flyer saying gay men are attracted to other men, that would be considered hate speech even though it’s factually true.

 

Another similar issue is calling something which could be used to discriminate against any group of people “anti-gay” as if they were the only group that mattered.

 

Instead of backing down from things like this, people need to stand up for themselves. If someone is opposed to a gay group holding a meeting in a church of all places, they shouldn’t be forced to retract that comment or make an apology. You can apologize when something is false.

Want an easy $30,000? Be an atheist!

In another example of judicial absurdity, a Quebec non-religious person demanded the city council of Saguenay  remove all religious symbols and stop a 20-second prayer in the morning. Alain Simoneau complained to the Human Rights Tribunal, a kangaroo court that routinely persecutes Christians. But it gets weirder.

 

The court not only sided with the atheist, and ordered the city council to remove all religious symbols and to stop prayers, but then the court, for some bizarre reason, told the council to pay this man $30,000! So he didn’t like religious symbols, demanded they be removed, complained, got his way, but they somehow felt he deserved $30,000 on top of that!! What a crazy world we’re living in. How is this even possible!?

 

What “damage” did he suffer from the 20 second prayer? How can anyone in their right mind think this whiner deserves $30,000! I cannot understand this, and any rational atheist shouldn’t be able to either.

 

This kind of judicial absurdity has gone too far. Recently on my other non-religious blog on the subject of freedom, I wrote an article about a woman who was awarded $6000 for simply being asked to wear a bikini top. She didn’t do it, she refused. But yet the court felt she was owed $6000. This makes no sense. If she doesn’t want to work there, she can quit.

 

But to make the Quebec case even worse, the “Human Rights” Tribunal isn’t even a court, it’s a tribunal. Fortunately, the mayor against whom the claim was made, Jean Tremblay, appealed the decision to the Quebec provincial court who ruled in his favour. But now the whole thing is going to the Supreme Court.

 

I actually tend to agree that a city council should be neutral in the area of religion. But I also think the public sector should be much smaller to make such matters mostly irrelevant. What happens on private property in terms of religion is of no concern to the government. But that’s a topic for another day. The problem with having religion at a political level is the government uses force, whereas the private sector uses voluntary interactions. Plus I believe in the separation of church and state.

 

Having said that, not everything that happens in government has to do with force. If an individual politician wants to recite a prayer at an event, people can choose whether or not they participate. There can be rules around it and others can be free to say their own prayers.

 

The big problem I have in this case is that they believe an atheist deserves $30,000 just for making a complaint. The legal system should be used to restore people to their status before something criminal happened. He could claim, for instance, he was forced to participate in prayer for several years. This would probably be an absurd claim unless there was some statute written saying if a politician doesn’t participate they are fired or something, which I highly doubt. But just for argument sake, say he felt coerced. Well, they could compensate him for 20 seconds per day for probably 150 days per year. That’s 50 minutes per year. So over three years, 150 minutes. Assume he makes $40 per hour, that’s $100. That would make sense, but $30,000?

 

They’re saying that he is owed around $12,000 for every HOUR that he had to sit through the “torture” of hearing a few people say a quick prayer. Does anyone think this sounds right? This is assuming he was forced, but how would we define “force”? Did people forcibly lift him up and take his arm and make him make the sign of the cross? Of course not. He could have just sat there, he probably could have listened to headphones, etc.

 

Human Rights Tribunals have made a mockery of justice. No one deserves to be massively rewarded for a minor inconvenience. Hopefully the Supreme Court agrees and throws out the absurd case.

 

Plus what about everyone else’s rights? I was in a workplace one time where everyone took turns mocking Christianity, declaring their opposition to it, etc. As a Catholic, I did not enjoy being in that environment, but did I sue anyone? Could I sue anyone? Probably not. In the history of most human rights tribunals in Canada, there hasn’t been a single case brought forth because of persecution of a Christian, at least none that have been allowed. However, Christians have often been the victims of these illegitimate farces.

 

====UPDATE====

 

I was writing this article throughout the day today, and I just received word that the Supreme Court of Canada unanimously rejected prayer in the city council chambers. But they also said the plaintiff must be paid $33,200, which is even more than before. I also learned that the mayor had given the option to not attend the first minute or two of meetings where prayers took place if someone didn’t want to. So the plaintiff could have just stayed out of the room and there wouldn’t be a problem.

 

But no, that wasn’t good enough, the mayor had to be punished to the tune of $33,200. This is completely outrageous! I don’t think this is even the mayor’s own money, this is taxpayers’ money and it’s going to some whiney brat looking for a payday? And it’s not as though Quebec and Catholicism are completely unrelated. Catholicism basically founded Quebec. I’m amazed at the street and city names found in Quebec. Almost every one is of a saint, often very obscure ones. Their Catholic heritage cannot be denied!

 

But of course, in our new modern world, Christians are to be treated the most harshly and given the fewest rights. Hopefully Canada will change this path that it’s on!

 

 

Rest in Peace Cardinal Turcotte

The archbishop of Montreal died today after suffering from health issues related to diabetes. He was 78 years old. Turcotte served as archbishop of the city for 22 years from 1990 until 2012 when he reached the maximum age for a cardinal of 75 years. He became a cardinal in 1994 at the age of 57.

 

Strong Opponent of Abortion

Turcotte was a stalwart opponent of abortion, so much so that he gave back his Order of Canada when the same recognition was given to promoter of child-killing Henry Morgentaler.

 

When speaking with CBC, he said "I'm worried about how we treat life, from conception to death, " he said "I decided to take a stance that clearly reflects my convictions."

 

This is a great and clear way to speak about the horrors and evils of abortion. Giving back his award probably had a much greater impact on the public than actually receiving it. It also makes perfect sense. If Turcotte received an award for his humanitarian work, this medal is nothing but a huge hypocrisy if it is also given to someone responsible for millions of deaths of society’s most vulnerable and innocent.

 

He was the kind of voice Canada needed and continues to need. Rest in Peace Great Cardinal Turcotte!

 

We Love You But....

In another twisted tale involving sperm donors and other unnatural and immoral reproduction methods, a lesbian couple is suing an American company who claimed the sperm donor was a healthy man with a master’s degree, but was in fact a man with schizophrenia who was a college dropout. So now the couple is suing the company who provided the sperm because of this false information. It’s the company’s fault though right? Wrong. It’s the fault of people who want to play God. We were never designed as human beings to anonymously put together reproductive cells without ever meeting. This is just wrong on so many levels.

 

First you are treating an unborn child like a commodity, ordering sperm cells through a company and never meeting the actual father. There is no act of love from which this child is conceived, but rather masked lab technicians prepare egg and sperm in petri dishes. A child, rather than being conceived in the embrace of loving parents, is manufactured at the hands of a stranger in a brightly lit laboratory surrounded by chemicals and latex gloves. The parents in this case do not even know each other. The child, rather than being the result of a loving union is the result of being fused together in a laboratory by a scientist. There is no love, only a financial transaction.

 

If this child is eventually implanted into the womb of a woman and is eventually born, he will be one of the lucky ones. Many others, probably most, are either destroyed or left in an indefinite frozen limbo.

 

These stories are now a dime-a-dozen. There are stories of “parents” suing sperm banks because their child didn’t live up to their expectations. Can you imagine a child growing up knowing he was not only manufactured by a stranger using the sperm of a father he’ll never know, but that the mother was upset with her purchase and sued the laboratory that manufactured him because he wasn’t up to her expectations. Think this kid might possibly have issues?

 

For all the disturbing details, check out the article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sperm-bank-allegedly-gives-couple-wrong-donor-info-1.3022603

 

 

Good Friday Pro-life March 2015 St. John's NL

Today at 9:30am a group of committed pro-lifers in St. John’s NL gathered at the Health Sciences Centre as they’ve done for close to 40 years to protest the evil of abortion. Not only is abortion legal in Newfoundland, it’s funded by taxpayers (often against their will). We walked around the parking lot about 5 or 6 times. After the walk, we gathered to sing hymns and to pray.

 

It was a great event. The theme was that all life is valuable and that this must remain the case. Otherwise, our respect for life slips away gradually until eventually human life is trivial and no longer sacred. Christ gave his life for us, and we should respect all human life.

 

Of course at this event also was the ever-expanding group of pro-abortionists who yelled and screamed nonsensical chants. This might sound like a biased opinion, but let’s review some of the chants that were offered. Keep in mind, this group had an entire year to formulate new chants. This is the best they could come up with:

 

Keep your rosaries off our ovaries!

I don’t recall any pro-lifers attempting to somehow apply rosary beads to anyone’s ovaries. Okay, maybe they mean it figuratively. But again, the pro-life movement doesn’t concern itself with saving women’s ovaries. Generally pro-lifers are opposed to bodily mutilation, but that’s a personal choice. What we are concerned with is the unborn child. Again, let’s be generous and assume the rosary beads to which the abortion advocates are referring is morality? Yes, our moral system says it is wrong to kill a child. I don’t think this is unreasonable.

 

This is what democracy looks like – that is what hypocrisy looks like!

According to pro-abortionists, their support for abortion is an exercise in democracy, while our support of not killing babies in the womb is hypocritical. I suppose democracy and hypocrisy rhyme, but other than that this makes very little sense. What even is democracy in the first place? It’s the rule of the populace. People vote for policies they favour. Pro-abortionists favour taxpayer funded abortion, while pro-lifers favor making killing unborn children illegal. I’m not quite sure how it’s hypocritical to oppose abortion. Wouldn’t hypocrisy be seen on a case-by-case basis. It would be hypocritical maybe for someone to perform abortions then rally to end it. But that’s not what’s happening here.

 

Get your theology off our biology!

Another nonsensical rallying cry of the pro-abortion movement. I’m assuming by this they mean something similar to the aforementioned slogan about keeping our rosaries off their ovaries. You’ll notice Catholics don’t campaign to end the practice of people eating meat on Good Friday or to force everyone to go to Mass each week even though these are theological issues. The reason Catholics protest abortion is because of our belief that life begins at conception and therefore an abortion kills a child. Writing off the protest as nothing but a theological concern is disingenuous. And again, we are not concerned with their “biology”, we are concerned with the human life involved. If a Catholic group protested murder or rape, would this also be called a “theological” objection that has no place in the public square. Plus, theology is the study of God. But even atheists can and do oppose abortion. So again, this chant is absurd.

 

Clearly the pro-abortion movement does not rely on logic or reason to put their points across. They rely completely on emotion, acting as if they are victims of religious oppression. Logically they don’t have a leg to stand on which is why over and over you see groups in universities forcefully disallowing debates on life to even take place.

 

Another point I would like to address about our pro-life demonstration is the schism that has taken place. While one group of pro-lifers is walking around the health sciences parking lot, another large group attends a pro-life ecumenical service at a church. While both may have value, I believe we should present a united front. The ecumenical church gathering should take place before or after the walk so people can attend both. The more people who walk around the health sciences parking lot, the better. It is a more effective witness.

 

Some people believe the ecumenical service is specifically scheduled to coincide with the march in order to replace it. If this is true, this is a truly sad situation. Once enough people join the walk, it will reach a critical mass and more and more new people will come on board. At some point we could influence the law.

 

Let’s hope for the continued success of the Good Friday Pro-Life March!

What the Terrible Tragedy in France Reminds Us Of

147 people were killed today when their plane crashed in the French alps. They were headed from Barcelona, Spain to Dusseldorf, Germany.  It’s a very tragic and sad story. My heart goes out to the victims and their families. We always hear that air travel is safe, and generally it is the safest method of travel. But usually when a plane crashes, the consequences are very serious. None of those people thought they would die today. There are thousands of flights each day, and statistics overwhelmingly tell us we’ll survive. But then a tragedy like this happens. What it shows is the impermanence of life. It can be snuffed out in an instant without warning.

 

We need to be ready at all times. I especially need to remind myself of this. Death could be just around the corner and the stakes are so high there is no time for fooling around. I was watching a show the other day about a lady who was in bed asleep and a psychopath broke into her house and murdered her. There was no rhyme or reason for the attack. She couldn’t have anticipated it. The stakes for death are so high because of hell. If it were the case that when we die we just rot in the earth, then fine you can do whatever you like. It won’t matter in the long run. But if you could potentially spend an eternity in hell, then the risk is so unbelievably high, it would make absolutely no sense to ever take that chance, no matter how remote.

 

Think of it statistically. I remember an idea about expected value. Basically it went like this: A 10% chance of winning $1000 is the same as a 50% chance of winning $200. Both have an expected value of $100. When it comes to hell, the stakes are infinite, i.e. an eternity in hell. So even if you have only a 0.000000001% chance of dying in a particular day, when you multiply this by infinity, the results are still infinitely bad. Therefore we should always strive to be in a state of grace.

 

It reminds me of Pascale’s wager. He basically said there are four possibilities. Either you act morally good or you don’t. Then with each of these hell either exists or it doesn’t. If hell exists and you act morally you go to heaven, but if you don’t act morally you go to hell. If hell doesn’t exist and you act morally, you rot in the ground, which is the same result if you don’t act morally. So in one out of four of these possibilities, you end up in heaven, one you end up in hell, and two you rot in the ground. The point Pascale goes on to make is that you’re better off living a moral life on the possibility that hell could exist than risking that it doesn’t. Even if you are an ardent atheist, even the slightest possibility that hell exists should motivate any person to act morally.

 

Many people talk about the end of the world, but really what we should be concerned about is our end. Whether we die before the world ends or we die as a result of the world ending is really immaterial to the question of our ultimate salvation. Also, as an addition to Pascale’s Wager, you can choose to either believe everyone goes to heaven or you can believe it’s very hard to get to heaven. Statistically speaking you’re much better off believing it is difficult to enter heaven than not. You won’t lose anything in the end by following the stricter morality. This is what always boggles my mind about preachers who try to soft-peddle the last four things (death, judgment, heaven, hell). Are they really prepared to put all their money on the possibility that it’s easy to get to heaven? What if they’re wrong? In their moral code, is it possible to be “too” strict and thus be prevented from entering the Kingdom of God? As if God says “Sorry you were too humble… you were too patient.” How absurd! Maybe they believe that by saying you could never go to hell, that makes it the truth? I really see no logic in this way of thinking. Again, you’re better off being “too” holy than not enough.

 

I think in light of a tragedy like the one in France, we should be on our guard as Jesus Christ warns.

Merry Christmas 2014! (and my experience at Midnight Mass)

Merry Christmas 2014 to you and yours!

Hey everyone, sorry I haven't been writing as much as before. Hopefully that'll improve.

Tomorrow I will be going to "midnight" Mass at the hospital. They have Mass there every day, but for the eve of Christ's Birth, it's a bigger event. But compared to other services in the city, it's going to probably be the smallest.

I find sometimes the Midnight Mass at my local church to be something of a "show". They have a huge choir that seems to be the center of attention. The priest usually gives a very cheery, Christmassy homily. The people in the congregation are overly touchy feely. Right before Mass actually begins there is a lot of chit-chat. For many, this continues throughout the service.

During the night, I see people whom I've never seen before. You can always spot reluctant teenagers who are only there because of some kind of threat.

Because so many of the parishioners never go throughout hte year, they are not familiar with proper etiquette. For example, there is applauding at some of the choir songs. But this is not completely the fault of those in the pews. Much, or most, of the blame goes to the choir itself. Inevitably, the choir decides to have a solo performance following communion. Normally everyone has already received communion by this point and really the priest should be concluding the Mass.

But instead, once everyone has taken their seat again, you'll hear the piano begin to play Ave Maria or O Holy Night. I do a mental facepalm and wait while the soloist performs his or her dramatic piece. Once it's over, there is silence.

This part is crucial. During this silence, the priest should quickly react by starting the ending prayers. But of course he doesn't. Instead, nothing happens. It is now beyond the point of no return. Applause is inevitable. First a few people will start to clap, as if we are at a concert, and then, as is customary in a recital hall, everyone else will join in. I just sit there cringing.

Some people ask why I'm so negative and possibly mean-spirited. But they misunderstand. I would simply ask what the Mass IS. Is the Mass a gathering of the community to hear pleasant things about Christmas and to listen to some nice holiday music? No. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the re-presentation of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. We are transported through time and space to Calvary where Jesus gave his life for our sins.

Any music or reading or anything else any human does during this sacred event is only to highlight the life and death of Jesus Christ. Therefore applauding the singer, or the choir, or any other human is missing the point altogether of the liturgy. This is not a concern, it's not a form of entertainment. Applause is the recognition of a human accomplishment. During Mass, it represents a misunderstanding of the purpose and meaning of the Mass.

Bottom line: I will be going to a smaller service in the hospital. Hopefully it will stay true to the real meaning of Christmas.

You'll never guess who I saw at the airport [Hint: He's a Catholic Answers Live Guest]

On one of my many connection flights from Phoenix to St. John's, NL (specifically the flight from Chicago to Ottawa), I saw the one and only Tim Staples of Catholic Answers Live. Of all the guests on the show, he is tied for first (along with Jimmy Akin).

At first, I wasn't sure it was him and I'm somewhat shy naturally. But then he took off his jacket, and his shirt said "Don't leave Peter because of Judas." Then I knew for sure it was him.

It was awesome getting to talk to Tim in person. He's very friendly. He told me about a conference he was having in Ottawa on the subject of his new book called Behold Your Mother which is a biblical defense of the Marian doctrines of the Catholic Church.

After the flight, I had to pick up my bags, as did Tim, so I went to speak with him. I worked up enough courage to ask to take the selfie you see above.

Tim told me his wife just gave birth to their sixth child. What a blessed family.

I hope his conference goes well in Ottawa!

Libertarian inconsistency on Abortion

As many people know I consider myself a libertarian. I do not believe this conflicts with my Catholicism, although many have said it does. The bottom line of the philosophy is that individuals act and we cannot demand the state force people to do something to accomplish our goal. But enough about that for now. Let's talk about abortion and libertarian contradictions.

First off, many libertarians are pro-life including Ron and Rand Paul, Julie Borowski, a famous libertarian vlogger, and Libertarian Party Candidate Bill Barr. I believe the rates of pro-life people in libertarianism is close to the general public.

Many famous libertarian philosophers have put their support behind legal abortion, but on very shaky ground in my opinion. Let me explain.

Ayn Rand, someone whom many libertarians follow but whom I do not much like, said the idea of a fetus having rights is nonsense. Only at birth does the fetus acquire rights, according to her. But what changes in her opinion? It seems more of a subjective, opinion-based idea than one that is logically consistent. From where does a fetus magically receive his rights after leaving the mother's womb? I'm not sure if she explains this at any point.

Walter Block supports an idea called "evictionism". Basically he says you can evict a person from your body but you cannot kill them. Strangely he says the woman may legally abort if the fetus is not viable outside the womb. Given those two facts, he is basically saying a woman can only remove a fetus from her body if she's sure the baby will die.

The idea of evictionism is absurd in this context. It is derived from the idea that one can use force on a trespasser who refuses to leave your property. However, can you really consider an unborn baby a trespasser? First of all, the fetus developed directly from a woman's own act. This is an implied invitation for this possibility. It would be akin to inviting someone onto your property. Once you do this, can you legitimately forcibly remove the person? Not morally you cannot.

You could ask this person to leave and if they do not you could use force as a last resort. However, a fetus cannot be asked to leave. Especially if it is not viable. It has no choice but to stay. Removing the fetus would mean certain death. It would be like inviting someone onto your property into the middle of the dessert. Then after they arrive, you tell them to leave knowing they will certainly die without any water. In fact I would go further to say you didn't even invite them. They had no control over being there, then you demand they exit into certain death. This is more similar to a fetus. A fetus does not decide to enter a particular woman's womb on its own. It is formed in the womb of the mother and only others decision causes his or her existence. Therefore, the eviction is even worse morally speaking.

Other positions in support of abortion in the libertarian community rely on the idea that a woman, like anyone else, should not be forced to be a slave to someone else or to breed because someone else demands it. A couple of issues arise. According to this logic, a mother of a 1 year old baby living in a rural community can choose to simply abandon her child or expose it to the elements knowing he or she will probably die because "no one is a slave" and should not be forced to take care of someone if they do not want to.

Logically speaking libertarians in favor of abortion must also be in favor of child-abandonment even when this means death to the child. However, no libertarian I've heard has so far has dared suggest this. Libertarian pro-choice is not different than any other form of pro-choice philosophy. I hesitate to even call it a philosophy because it's based purely on emotion. As usual, the only argument exists in whether or not an unborn child is a person. If so, no justification for taking his or her life is sufficient. If not, no justification is necessary.

7 Steps of Writing News About the Catholic Church

I was watching a very formulaic report about the Catholic Church and I assumed it was from some internet news agency with a small budget. I found out that it was actually from the BBC. I was boggled at how simple and overdone the format is and was shocked anyone still took these organizations seriously.

Here is every report you will ever hear about the Catholic Church:

1) The pope is holding a synod, council or assembly of some kind.
2) With Pope Francis in charge, many feel he will make some change that will popularize the Church in the eyes of the general public.
3) Mention contraception and/or abortion and/or divorce and/or gay marriage
4) Talk about hope for change, but warn that huge changes (the kind ultimately wanted by the general population) will probably not happen.
5) Vaguely analogize the Church as a large vessel being turned around.
6) Imply that given the chance, Pope Francis would endorse gay marriage, abortion, and contraception, but he is sensitive to the "bigots" of the Church.
7) Finish up by looking forward to when the Church will truly "advance" and be acceptable to the general population.

This formula is applied to virtually every news story about the Catholic Church. It implies the church only cares about sexual issues, and that the Church's main goal is to be popular with everyone. I'm getting kind of fed up with every news article being the same.

First communion and confirmation

I attended a first communion and confirmation at my local church a couple of weeks ago. If there is a crisis in the church, I think this event could explain a lot of it. I discovered a lot of what is wrong with how Christianity is portrayed to children and families.

I will say the sacraments were conducted in a very childish way. First of all, there was no seriousness in the congregation. People were acting the same as they would at a child's recital. They were talking, laughing, and everyone was commenting on how cute all the children were.

Then the actual event began. First, two girls came out dressed in ballet outfits and did some sort of interpretive dance. No one knew what was going on and it had nothing to do with Christianity. After this, the confirmation children began singing a silly and childish song which included a lot of sign-language-type gestures for rainbows, unicorns, and other things.

To an outside observer, the ceremony could have easily been a school play for pre-schoolers or some form of dance recital. It had nothing to do with Christianity. The entire atmosphere was very egocentric. Look at us perform! The children are not to blame, they were being manipulated. Those to blame are the organizers.

Encouraging the charade and making it much worse were the parents and families. Most weren't paying any attention to the Mass or sacraments whatsoever. They were talking, laughing, talking about their children, etc. No spirituality whatsoever. Just something "fun" to do on the weekend.

The problem with all of this is that it presents Christianity as something childish and silly, something like Sesame Street. The lapsed Catholic parents obviously didn't think what was going on was a big deal. Jesus is just a buddy or chum for children to make them feel better when they get scared at night.

But Christianity is meant to be for the real world, for the worst tragedies in life. Christianity is meant to give us peace and joy and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. It's not a children's cartoon on Saturday morning.  But that's what children and their families are being presented with and that's why people stop going to Mass when they reach 12 years old.

Watch the canonization of Pope John Paul II and Pope John XXIII Live [VIDEO]

Funny spelling mistake on Vatican Youtube video

I came across a video that was uploaded a few days ago by the Vatican on Youtube. Check out the funny spelling error in the title:

Instead of Sacred "Heart" of Jesus Parish they typed "Hart".

The video is here.

Catholic Teaching on Sperm Banks

This might sound like a weird topic, but I bring it up because I just heard a news story about a felon who switched his sperm with another man's and the man's wife was impregnated with the wrong sperm. So she ended up not having her husband's child, but some random person's whom she didn't know. This probably happens more than people expect. And it's all too possible with all these immoral sexual practices.

If a couple follows God's natural law on conception, this craziness would never happen. The Church says sex must be both potentially procreative and unitive. If either element is missing, it's an immoral act.

Children are not some sort of trophy. People nowadays just plan out their perfect family the same way they buy furniture or a new car. Then if they find out the child they ordered turned out not as they'd hoped, they just destroy it for another one. That's why 92% of Down Syndrome babies are aborted. Just like sending back an ipad that you didn't like.

So couples think of children as an accessory to their lives, just something on their to-do list that they can check off. And then when they have their ideal 1 boy and 1 girl, they mutilate their bodies through vasectomies and hysterectomies so they won't have any more kids. I guess that goal has been accomplished.

Another belief is that sex and procreation are two completely separate ideas, as if they have nothing to do with one another. It would be like thinking eating and nourishing your body as two separate acts with nothing in common. In reality, in nature, procreation is a product of sex, they are inextricably linked. In nature, they aren't two different things.

So Pope Paul VI said contraception was bad. It's pretty obvious, unless you're a "modern" person, that this is true. It's true because when you separate sex and procreation, all kinds of weird things happen. For one thing people start using sperm banks and fertility treatment. Instead of having sex with each other, the couple does their own thing separately and the woman ultimately ends up pregnant on a hospital bed with a doctor impregnating her. Or two gametes are artificially joined together in a sterile lab then inserted into a woman's body. What a strange way to be conceived.

That's procreation, but sex becomes weird too. No longer attached to procreation, sex is just about pleasure so as long as two or more (or fewer) people are having fun then it's totally legit. No one stops and says, hold on a second, this is not procreative so it's stupid and pointless. That's what they would say back when everyone did not have a contraceptive mentality. It'd be like eating a pile of food and then going to the bathroom and forcing yourself to vomit it out. We still connect eating with nutrition so people still say that's weird. Well, having sex while preventing procreation makes just as much sense.

But also inherently infertile sex is totally legit in this new paradigm. Extramarital sex, gay sex, or any other kind of sex is fine, it's just for entertainment. Kind of like games. Some people like video games, others like board games. I wouldn't judge someone for liking video games, even if I don't like playing them. Well that's how people think about sex. Since it has nothing to do with procreation, then who cares who you do it with.

Anyway, people gotta snap out of it. It's all an abomination. A child deserves more than to be born in a test tube and surgically inserted into a woman. He deserves dignity. It's ironic that we kill so many kids through abortion and then go to incredible and immoral lengths to conceive. Why don't the women who don't want their babies just give them to families that do.

To read more about the criminal who switched his sperm with the real father, click here.

Is the New Canadian Cardinal orthodox enough?

Whenever a Catholic prelate is assigned to a high office, many Catholics wonder if he will be orthodox or not. There is always a fear that a church leader will try to implement some newfangled theology or be a big fan of interpretive dance taking place during Mass.

So when Pope Francis chose Archbishop of Quebec Gérald Lacroix those questions naturally arose. At first I could not find much information on the subject. Media outlets were simply presenting objective facts and did not give any clues as to the Cardinal-elect's positions or opinions.

Then I dug a little further and found out some interesting information. It seems Lacroix is very interested in orthodoxy and presenting a historical and full Gospel. He is not interested in innovation and in fact he is very critical of this approach.

As educated Catholics know, there is no such thing as conservative or liberal when it comes to Church teaching. You are either orthodox or not. Lacroix is definitely orthodox. To prove this, here are some things the prelate has said over the years:

Here's a great interview he did with the National Post. I like how he questions the questions. So the first query asked by the Post was how the new archbishop (this was written in 2011) would get people into the pews of the churches in Quebec. He said "I think the first thing is not to try to bring people back to the pews. People in Quebec will resist that." He goes on to say the focus is not to increase numbers in some utilitarian way, but rather to change hearts and minds and people will come naturally. To read the rest of the interview, go here.

In another great interview, Archbishop Lacroix, whose name means "The Cross" is asked about softening or watering down the message of the Gospel to attract people. He flat out rejects this proposition, stating: “We’re not telling people, listen we have a new message, It’s not going to be as demanding as we were before, we’ve found a smooth version of the Gospel; it won’t be so difficult to live, it’s going to be easy, come right in, no that’s not what it’s all about”. To read the rest of this interview, click here.

Overall, from everything I've seen so far, Lacroix seems like a very solid choice, and given the fact that he was chosen by the Holy Father, it says a lot about the Pontiff as well.

Happy Feast of Christ's Baptism everyone.

God Bless.