Quote of the Day

“He who labors as he prays lifts his heart to God with his hands.”

--Saint Benedict

Quote of the Day

"The Church is the people who serve the Lord. For this, it is the people who experiences his freedom and lives in this freedom that He gives. The Lord always gives true freedom. First of all, the freedom from sin, from selfishness in all its forms: the freedom to give of oneself and to do so with joy, like the Virgin of Nazareth, who is free from herself, she does not close in on herself in her condition – and she would have had reason! – but thinks of those who, in that moment, has greater need. She is free in the freedom of God, which is realized in love. And this is the freedom that God has given us and we must not lose it: the freedom to adore God, to serve God and to serve him even in our brothers and sisters."

--Pope Francis

Happy Fourth of July

An elderly friend of mine passed this along via email. I haven't double checked to make sure it's all true, but I reckon most of it is. It helps you get into the proper spirit and remember what we are really celebrating today on Independence Day. Hope you enjoy it. Here it is:

JULY 4TH

Some interesting facts about our founders...scroll down for a little bit of history as we honor our nation's birthday.

Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence ?

Five signers were captured by the British as traitors, and tortured before they died.

Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned.

Two lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary Army; another had two sons captured.

Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the Revolutionary War.

They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

What kind of men were they?

Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists.

Eleven were merchants, nine were farmers and large plantation owners; men of means, well educated, but they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured.

Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships swept from the seas by the British Navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags.

Thomas McKean was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, And poverty was his reward.

Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of Dillery, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton.

At the battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson, Jr., noted that the British General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters. He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt.

Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed. The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.

John Hart was driven from his wife's bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home only to find his wife dead and his children vanished.

So, take a few minutes while enjoying your 4th of July holiday and silently thank these patriots. It's not much to ask for the price they paid.

Remember: freedom is never free!

I hope you will show your support by sending this to as many people as you can. It's time we get the word out that patriotism is NOT a sin, and the Fourth of July has more to it than beer, picnics, and baseball games.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY AND GOD BLESS AMERICA!!!

Two Important Victories for Life and Liberty

Thanks be to God and to His Holy Mother, Mary Immaculate, Patroness of the United States, for granting our nation two important victories for life and liberty at the end of last month. Both of these victories were decisions handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court during the third annual Fortnight for Freedom.

On June 27, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled unconstitutional a law in Massachusetts that prohibited peaceful pro-life prayer warriors, protestors, and counselors from setting foot within thirty-five feet of an abortion clinic. No doubt strongly supported by Planned Parenthood, this so-called "buffer zone" law was a direct attack on freedom of speech. It was also an indirect attack on innocent human life, since its effect was to increase the number of abortions in the state of Massachusetts. Although the Court remained silent on the morality and legality of abortion, it had enough sense to clearly perceive the freedom of speech issue involved here. Now the pro-life movement in Massachusetts is free to do its important, life-saving work without interference from the state government. No doubt thousands of innocent unborn lives there will be saved in the coming years. Thanks be to God.

Then on June 30, the High Court handed down its widely anticipated decision in the Burwell v. Hobby Lobby case. By just one vote, the Court ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby and against the Obama administration, striking down part of the HHS mandate within ObamaCare that requires owners of secular for-profit businesses to include abortion-inducing drugs and contraceptives in their health insurance plans for their employees, even if this violates their religious beliefs and moral principles. The Court ruled that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton in 1993, applies to owners of for-profit businesses, and that the federal government cannot force them to violate their consciences. This is a great victory for our First Amendment rights, for our right to act in accord with the law of God, and also for the unborn across our country, many of whose lives will be spared as a result of this decision. Moreover, this ruling has significant implications for what is left of the HHS mandate and ObamaCare, which are both looking more and more like Swiss cheese. If for-profit owners of secular businesses who object to providing abortifacients and contraceptives for religious and moral reasons are exempt from the anti-life mandate, then why shouldn't directors of religious and secular not-for-profit organizations who object to it for similar reasons be exempted as well? Why shouldn't EWTN and Catholic and Christian colleges and hospitals be exempted? Why aren't their CEOs legally free to follow their religious and moral beliefs in their administration of education and health care?

The Obama administration's exemption for religious institutions currently in force is based on a very narrow definition of "religious institution" as an organization that primarily hires and serves members of its own faith. That leaves out practically 99 percent of religious institutions in this country, most of which are not exclusive or cultist but part of the broader society, hiring and serving people of all faiths and none at all. Some of these religious institutions have rightly won their own exemptions from the mandate in state and federal courts. The remainder are still being coerced by the Obama administration against their religion and conscience, and against the First Amendment, into providing coverage for anti-life drugs that have no health benefits whatsoever. This has to stop. The Supreme Court must confirm the more than two dozen injunctions already granted by lower courts to dozens of religious organizations, and extend them to all religious institutions in America. The federal government has no right to pick and choose who can freely practice their religion and follow their conscience and who cannot. Our Constitution forbids the government from prohibiting the free exercise of religion. Therefore, the High Court must uphold the religious liberties and moral conscience rights of all Americans without exception. And that, necessarily, will mean the death of the HHS mandate and the demise of ObamaCare.

Once again, thanks be to God and His Holy Mother for these two victories for human life and liberty in our nation. We must keep praying and taking action to defend our God-given rights and liberties. Let freedom ring!

Quote of the Day

“God is bound to us, He chose us, and this bond is for ever, not because we are faithful but because the Lord is faithful and tolerates our infidelity, our slowness, our lapses. God is not afraid of bonding with us. He loves these bonds, he creates bonds; bonds which free, rather than constrain...

“[Today] fidelity is a value under threat, as we are induced always to seek change, presumed novelty, negotiating the roots of our existence, of our faith...

“Without fidelity to its roots, however, a society does not move ahead; it may make great technical progress, but not the full progress of all man and all humankind. God's faithful love towards His people was made manifest and fully realised in Jesus Christ... He remains faithful and never betrays; even when we err, He always awaits us to forgive us: He is the face of the merciful Father...

“We are able to experience and savour the tenderness of this love in every phase of life: in times of joy and of sadness, in times of health and of infirmity and sickness. God's faithfulness teaches us to welcome life as a manifestation of His love and enables us to bear witness to this love to our brethren in humble and meek service.”

--Pope Francis

Reflection for Corpus Christi

"Jesus' bread discourse, on one hand, points the main movement of the Incarnation and of the Paschal journey toward the sacrament, in which Incarnation and Easter are permanently present, but conversely, this has the effect of integrating the sacrament, the Holy Eucharist, into the larger context of God's descent to us and for us. On one hand, then, the Eucharist emphatically moves right to the center of Christian existence; here God does indeed give us the manna that humanity is waiting for, the true "bread of heaven" -- the nourishment we can most deeply live upon as human beings. At the same time, however, the Eucharist is revealed as man's unceasing great encounter with God, in which the Lord gives himself as "flesh," so that in him, and by participating in his way, we may become "spirit." Just as he was transformed through the Cross into a new manner of bodiliness and of being-human pervaded by God's own being, so too for us this food must become an opening out of our existence, a passing through the Cross, and an anticipation of the new life in God and with God."

--Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth--Part One: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration (Doubleday, 2007, pp. 269--270)

America's Back-Door Enemy and the Situation in Iraq

In a few days, on June 23, I will mark the fifth anniversary of the release of my first book, America's Back-Door Enemy. I would like to thank all those who have purchased and read it (or listened to it) over these past five years. I've been thinking that this book is getting a bit obsolete by now, but then the news headlines about the situation in Iraq jumped out at me and showed me that I was wrong: the book is just as relevant now as when it was first published, and we need to heed the lessons it contains as we discuss and form opinions regarding US foreign policy toward Iraq.

As Iraq descends ever deeper into violence and chaos, as "Islamic" radicals take over the country, as Christians continue to flee in droves, and as the country continues sliding ever closer to full-fledged civil war, it seems that everyone is criticizing President Obama's foreign policy, and I won't deny that there is plenty of room for criticism there. But it seems that no one is daring to criticize or call into question President Bush's foreign policy, which is what got us into the current mess. Make no mistake: it was the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 that set the stage for what we are seeing happen now in that ancient and historic country.

As I point out in the book, Pope (now Saint) John Paul II, along with Catholic bishops in both the US and Iraq, warned that a military invasion of Iraq would have unacceptable consequences for the civilian population of that country and for the stability of the whole region. Specifically, Saint John Paul predicted that a war with Iraq and the removal of Saddam Hussein from power would lead to a mass exodus of Christians from the country; would leave a power vacuum to be filled by violent "Islamic" fundamentalists; would lead to civil war; and would destabilize the entire Middle East. I am not justifying or excusing any of the atrocities that the dictator Saddam Hussein committed against his own people. I am simply saying that leaving him in power would have been the lesser of two evils, and pointing out that our Pope and bishops had good reasons for opposing the alternative of war which the Bush administration unfortunately carried out. What they predicted is exactly what is happening now. Iraq is falling apart. The whole Middle East is collapsing. Millions of people have lost their homes and are now living in refugee camps in Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and elsewhere, largely ignored and forgotten by the world outside, while terrorists and guerillas and armies plot death and destruction with impunity. Our invasion of Iraq was supposed to bring freedom and democracy and security to the country; instead, it has opened the door to anarchy, tyranny, and civil war.

In America's Back-Door Enemy, I unveil the real reasons for the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which had nothing to do with either freedom or democracy and everything to do with war profiteering for US defense manufacturers, control of Iraq's vast oil reserves, and the development of the Greater Israel so ardently desired by Israel's radical Zionist minority. As I demonstrate clearly in the book, these Zionist extremists are the "back-door enemy" secretly manipulating US and Israeli foreign policy and taking advantage of "Islamic" terrorist violence to advance their own wicked agenda. War in the Middle East is a key method of advancing this agenda. As Pope Francis has pointed out, when a war is being concocted, we should ask ourselves: Who is going to profit from this? We hear constantly about "Islamic" terrorists and their evil plans, and I am not here to downplay the horror and evil of the violence they perpetrate. But few people are aware of the existence and activity of radical Zionists, who are more subtle, more sophisticated, much more powerful, and far more dangerous than their "Islamic" counterparts. My book is a real eye-opener in this respect.

Some are now calling for a limited US military intervention in Iraq to take out the "Islamic" extremists and restore some measure of order in the country. My position as of this writing is firmly non-interventionist. For one thing, I do not believe that it is our job to police the world or to go about spreading freedom and democracy by force of arms, but rather that we should set a good example here in our own country for other nations to admire and imitate. Our nation's Founders established America as a "City on a Hill," not as a world empire or conqueror. The duty of our military is and should be to defend our own coastlines and borders from foreign aggression. I agree with Ron Paul and Pat Buchanan on this issue. For another thing, the US has been taking military action against Iraq on and off for years now, from the Persian Gulf War of 1991 to the low-level bombing raids of the late 1990s to the 2003 war, which really only just petered out a few years ago. What has all this war accomplished, for our country or for Iraq? Very little good and a great deal of harm. Additional warfare will not resolve Iraq's problems. Third, a US invasion of Iraq without the approval of the United Nations would constitute an act of aggression, just as the 2003 invasion did. For all its grave problems, Iraq is still a sovereign nation, and we should respect that sovereignty by leaving it alone and not barging our way in uninvited. Fourth, the previous wholesale US military occupation of Iraq failed to destroy "Islamic" terrorist groups and bring order and stability to the nation; on the contrary, terrorism rates under US occupation exploded far beyond what they had ever been under Saddam Hussein. It's a key principle of my book that war does not end terrorism; history bears this out time and time again.

Furthermore, the Iraqi Catholic bishops, who are more familiar with the complex situation in their own country than we are--subjected as we are to many false and misleading news reports--are opposed to any new US invasion of their country because it would only exacerbate the situation. There is great danger that a limited "surgical" strike such as currently proposed by President Obama will not stop at that but will grow into a lengthy full-fledged war involving hundreds of thousands of American troops, just as limited US involvement in Vietnam in the early 1960s grew and grew into a protracted and ultimately fruitless conflict that claimed many lives. Let us learn something from what history teaches us in this regard. Finally, I oppose any US military action in Iraq due to the influence of Pope Francis, who rallied the Church and the world to pray for peace in Syria and the Middle East last year. As the subsequent turn of events proved, prayer is powerful enough to change the course of history. What we need right now is not more warfare, even of the limited kind. What we need is prayer and fasting for the conversion of sinners and peace in the world. Iraq needs more prayer, not more bombs.

If you haven't yet read my book America's Back-Door Enemy, I would encourage you to do so. It is still available in print, audio book and e-book from Tate Publishing as well as various online bookstores. Laying aside partisan politics and ideology, it offers a frank and honest discussion of post-9/11 US foreign policy from a solid Catholic perspective--a discussion that is much needed as the possibility of yet another US military intervention in the Middle East looms on the horizon.

Mary Queen of Peace, pray for us!

Archbishop Cordileone Fights the Good Fight

Some politicians, notably Catholic dissident Representative Nancy Pelosi, and some very vocal extremist homosexual activist groups have launched a vicious attack on Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, protesting his announced decision to participate in and speak at a rally preceding the second annual March for Marriage organized by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which is being held tomorrow in Washington, D.C. Archbishop Cordileone has responded with an excellent letter addressed to his detractors, in which he defends his public defense of traditional marriage. Here are a few excerpts from this letter, followed by my comments:

"I appreciate your affirmation of my Church’s teaching—not unique to our religion, but a truth accessible to anyone of good will—on the intrinsic human dignity of all people, irrespective of their stage and condition in life. That principle requires us to respect and protect each and every member of the human family, from the precious child in the womb to the frail elderly person nearing death. It also requires me, as a bishop, to proclaim the truth—the whole truth—about the human person and God’s will for our flourishing. I must do that in season and out of season, even when truths that it is my duty to uphold and teach are unpopular, including especially the truth about marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife. That is what I will be doing on June 19th."

Yes, the good archbishop is simply doing his job to teach and consistently defend the full truth of what God has revealed and what the Catholic Church teaches about the human person and the Creator's institution of marriage. Whether people accept or reject certain divinely revealed truths is irrelevant. The fullness of the truth must and always will be proclaimed by the Catholic Church. Those who accept the fullness of that truth belong to the Catholic Church; those who claim to be Catholic while rejecting one or more Church teachings are heretics. Human fashions and opinions are subject to change, but God's truth doesn't change. And how dare Nancy Pelosi, who claims to be Catholic, attack her own archbishop as an intolerant, anti-gay bigot for publicly defending the truth of what the Church teaches regarding the sacred institution of marriage! Archbishop Cordileone addresses this latter point as follows:

"The March for Marriage is not “anti-LGBT” (as some have described it); it is not anti-anyone or anti-anything. Rather, it is a pro-marriage March. The latter does not imply the former. Rather, it affirms the great good of bringing the two halves of humanity together so that a man and a woman may bond with each other and with any children who come from their union. This is precisely the vision promoted by Pope Francis, who recently said, “We must reaffirm the right of children to grow up in a family with a father and mother.” Rest assured that if the point of this event were to single out a group of individuals and target them for hatred, I most certainly would not be there."

Right on. Part of the tired old mainstream media spin is to cast pro-life and pro-marriage Americans as wild-eyed, hateful, bigoted attackers of those who are pro-abortion or in favor of legally equating same-sex unions with traditional marriage. This highly inaccurate portrayal is in fact more descriptive of pro-abortion extremists and homosexual activists. On the contrary, the overwheling majority of pro-life and pro-marriage Americans are people of good will who love and respect their enemies and who are doing their fellow men and women a great service by defending basic human rights and institutions that come from our Creator and form the foundations of our society and civilization. Yes, we must reaffirm the basic right of children to grow up in a traditional family, with a Mom and Dad. Defending that right is in no way an attack on homosexual persons.

"It gives me assurance that we share a common disdain for harsh and hateful rhetoric. It must be pointed out, though, that there is plenty of offensive rhetoric which flows in the opposite direction. In fact, for those who support the conjugal understanding of marriage, the attacks have not stopped at rhetoric. Simply for taking a stand for marriage as it has been understood in every human society for millennia, people have lost their jobs, lost their livelihoods, and have suffered other types of retribution, including physical violence."

The archbishop points out here that those, like him, who defend traditional marriage are increasingly under attack for doing so. In other words, most of the unjust bigotry and intolerance are coming from homosexual activists, not from defenders of traditional marriage. He also alludes to the crucial fact that marriage as the union of a man and a woman is not just Catholic teaching, but a fundamental principle of the natural law that has been recognized by all human societies throughout world history. Traditional marriage is God's design, engraved on the human heart; it is and always has been the basic building block of society. When people who espouse it can be unjustly attacked with impunity for doing so, something is seriously wrong with that society.

In closing, Archbishop Cordileone requests that his attackers get to know him before passing judgment on him:

"Please do not make judgments based on stereotypes, media images and comments taken out of context. Rather, get to know us first as fellow human beings. I myself am willing to meet personally with any of you not only to dialogue, but simply so that we can get to know each other....When all is said and done, then, there is only one thing that I would ask of you more than anything else: before you judge us, get to know us."

Good advice. But will Nancy Pelosi and her homosexual friends take it? I hope so. Let's pray for them.

I commend Archbishop Cordileone for his courteous, thoughtful, and well-reasoned response to his handful of vocal critics. His uncompromising defense of Catholic teaching and the natural law regarding the holy institution of marriage is refreshing. At a time when corruption is rampant in American politics and business, thank God that at least we have many fine bishops like Cordileone who are not afraid to teach and defend the truth about the human person and society against the despicable attacks of godless radical secularists, some of whom masquerade as Catholics and who are traitors to Christ and His Church. If America manages to survive the current onslaught of radical secularism, much of the credit will be due to the Catholic Church and to her faithful shepherds, including Pope Francis and Archbishop Cordileone. Let's keep them also in our prayers, that they remain faithful to Christ and His Church and continue fighting the good fight.

Quote of the Day

“The corrupt politicians, the corrupt businessmen and the corrupt clergy, are to be found everywhere – and we have to tell the truth: corruption is precisely the sin that the person with authority – whether political, economic or ecclesiastical – over others has most readily at hand. We are all tempted to corruption. It is a ‘handy’ sin, for, when one has authority, one feels powerful, one feels almost like God...

“Think of the hospitals without medicine, the patients who did not receive care, the children without education. They are the modern Naboths, who pay the price for the corruption of the haughty. And who pays the price for the corruption of a prelate? The children pay, who cannot make the sign of the cross, who do not know the catechism, who are not cared for. The sick who are not visited, the imprisoned, who receive no spiritual attention. The poor pay. Corruption is paid by the poor: the materially poor and the spiritually poor."

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

“When the Lord wants to give us a mission, wants to give us a task, He prepares us. He prepares us to do it well, as he prepared Elijah. And the most important part of this is not that he has encountered the Lord: no, no, this is well enough. What is important is the whole journey by which we arrive at the mission the Lord entrusts to us. And this is the difference between the apostolic mission given us by the Lord, and a common task: ‘Ah, you have to complete this task, you have to do this or that…’ a human duty, honest, good… [But] when the Lord gives a mission, He always has us enter into a process, a process of purification, a process of discernment, a process of obedience, a process of prayer."

--Pope Francis

ElectionWatch 2014: Great News, and Lots of It!

As it turns out (and as I suspected), the victory of Tea Party candidate Joni Ernst, who won the Republican nomination to the U.S. Senate in Iowa early this month, was just the tip of the iceberg. Tea Party candidates are now sweeping primary elections all over the country, against the odds and despite the machinations of corrupt establishment politicians. In Mississippi, for example, Tea Party candidate Chris McDaniel received 1,386 more votes than longtime incumbent Republican Senator Thad Cochran, although the latter is well funded by Washington special interest groups and outspent McDaniel ten to one. Since he received less than 50 percent of the vote, McDaniel is now headed to a runoff election against Cochran on June 24. (Pray to Saint John the Baptist that he wins!) Tea Party candidates also won primaries in other states: Ben Sasse in Nebraska, Alex Mooney in West Virginia, Tim Scott in South Carolina. Tea Party candidates swept Texas, including John Ratcliffe who defeated Republican incumbent Ralph Hall in a runoff election (the first time in twenty years this happened). Even more dramatically, here in Virginia, Tea Party candidate David Brat soundly defeated Republican establishment favorite and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor--although Cantor had outspent Brat twenty-five to one on his campaign!

This is just the beginning of the Tea Party revolution of 2014 here in the United States. The American people are fed up with their corrupt establishment politicians in both the major parties, and they want good solid, trustworthy, religious, moral, pro-life, pro-family, and pro-Constitution candidates who truly represent their interests, not the interests of a select few. They are decisively rejecting career politicians who merely pretend to represent their interests while actually working to advance the interests of the giant abortion, GMO, junk food, manufacturing, pharmaceutical, insurance, and other industries, and all the while padding their own pockets. It's about time we started putting these corrupt politicians in their places! The twin grip of Big Government and Big Business on American politics and the economy is starting to slip. We the people have begun to take back our nation! We are winning! We Tea Partyers are finally in a position to take command of our national politics, for the glory of God and the good of our beloved country. With the help of Almighty God and Mary Immaculate, Patroness of the United States, we can and will reclaim the proper governance of our nation.

The only legitimate government authority comes from God and in fact belongs to the whole people, as Saint Thomas Aquinas and Saint Robert Bellarmine wrote. Thus, we the people have the right and the duty to establish our own government, and any government that is not responsible to the people (assuming a religious and moral people) is not legitimate. As Saint Augustine wrote, in the absence of justice, what is government but a band of robbers? That's a fit description of the Obama administration and most of the Democratic governors currently in office. With the upcoming general elections, we have the opportunity to restore some measure of good, honest, responsible, religious, moral, and constitutional government to Washington, D.C. and to our state governorships. Keep praying for our country, and be sure to Vote Tea Party!

Power to the people!

Oh, just a footnote: Sensing imminent defeat in battle, that career politician mentioned above, Senator Thad Cochran, has enlisted the help of a Goliath--former New York mayor, Republican establishment crown jewel Michael Bloomberg--who wields a gigantic $2.1 million sword, hoping thereby to defeat that nasty boy David, i.e., Chris McDaniel, in the Mississippi runoff on June 24. The race is pretty close at the moment, and that extra two million dollars just might deliver Cochran the nomination after all. Yes, the corrupt political establishment still might win a battle here and there. But it's losing the war big time. That is plainly evident from the slew of Tea Party victories reported above. The tide is turning in our favor, and will continue to do so. The Tea Party revolution is sweeping America! Praise the Lord!

Quote of the Day

"The world tells us that happiness, joy and entertainment are the best things in life. And it looks the other way when there are problems of disease or pain in the family. The world does not want to suffer, it prefers to ignore painful situations, to cover them up. Only the person who sees things as they are, and whose heart mourns, will be happy and will be comforted. Thanks to the consolation of Jesus, not to that of the world."

--Pope Francis

Pentecost Reflection

Pentecost, Duccio di Buoninsegna (1311)

"The Holy Spirit renders the Christian 'wise.' This, however, not in the sense that he has an answer for everything, that he knows everything, but in the sense that he “knows” of God, he knows how God acts, he knows when something is of God and when it is not of God; he has this wisdom which God gives to our hearts. In this sense, the heart of the wise man has the taste and flavor of God. And how important it is that such Christians be in our communities! Everything in them speaks of God and becomes a beautiful and living sign of His presence and His love. And this is something we cannot improvise, which we cannot acquire by ourselves: It is a gift that God gives those who are docile to the Holy Spirit. We have the Holy Spirit within us, in our heart; we can listen to Him or not listen to Him. If we listen to the Holy Spirit, He teaches us this way of wisdom, He gives us wisdom which is to see with God’s eyes, to hear with God’s ears, to love with God’s heart, to judge things with God’s judgment. This is the wisdom that the Holy Spirit gives us, and we can all have it, we only need to ask the Holy Spirit for it."

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

"It [the Resurrection of Christ] is a historical event that nevertheless bursts open the dimensions of history and transcends it. Perhaps we may draw upon analogical language here, inadequate in many ways, yet still able to open up a path toward understanding: as already anticipated in the first section of this chapter, we could regard the Resurrection as something akin to a radical 'evolutionary leap', in which a new dimension of life emerges, a new dimension of human existence."

--Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth--Holy Week: From the Entrance into Jerusalem to the Resurrection (Ignatius Press, 2011, pp. 273--274

ElectionWatch 2014: Primary Victory in Iowa

Two days ago, Tea Party candidate Joni Ernst won the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate from Iowa. This is an important victory for the Tea Party movement in the United States which highlights the resurgence of this movement despite the attempts of the reigning political establishment to suppress it. It's an indication, albeit an early and a small one, of what is probably going to happen this November when we the American people go to the polls: We're going to take back the Senate!

Fox News and other mainstream media outlets are already admitting that the Ernst campaign could change the balance of power in Washington. Of course, corrupt establishment Republicans and Democrats alike will spread lies, use psychological warfare, spend millions of dollars on advertising, and probably even utilize voter fraud in some close races to try to defeat the Tea Party--all of which they have been doing for the past six years. Granted, some of these tricks may produce the desired result in a few isolated cases as happened in 2010, but on the whole the desperate efforts of establishment politicians to cling to power will fail to hold back the wave of national rebellion now gaining momentum (as they failed to do in 2010). We the American people are fed up with the corrupt Obama administration and its overreaching policies, especially ObamaCare and the HHS mandate. We are going to elect (and re-elect) a slew of Tea Party candidates to state governorships as well as the U.S. House and Senate--citizen statesmen and women of religious faith and moral principle who will strive to return our country to greatness by governing in accordance with the law of God and the Constitution of the United States as the Founders intended. I'm looking forward to the next revolution in American politics, and hoping and praying that the Tea Party reform efforts won't be stymied or derailed by the big corporate lobbyist parasites in Washington who have been corrupting most of our nation's leaders for many years now.

Let's keep supporting all the Tea Party candidates with our prayers, our financial assistance, and our votes. They deserve them. Our nation's future depends on their leadership. And let's also pray for the conversion of our incumbent establishment politicians who continue to put power, money, and prestige ahead of concern for human rights and the common good.

More information and commentary on the historic 2014 elections coming soon!

Quote of the Day

"We must tell the truth: Christian life is not just one big party. Not at all! We cry, we cry so many times: when we are sick; when we have a problem with our son, in the family, with our daughter, or wife, or husband; when we see that our salary does not reach the end of the month and we have a sick child; when we see that we cannot pay the mortgage on the house and we must somehow survive ... So many problems, we have so many. But Jesus tells us: 'Do not be afraid!' 'Yes, you will be sad, cry and people will even rejoice, the people who are against you.'...

"Be courageous in suffering and remember that after, the Lord will come; after, joy will come, after the dark comes the sun. May the Lord give us all this joy in hope. And the sign that we have this joy in hope is peace. How many sick, who are at the end of life, in pain, have that peace of soul.

“This is the seed of joy, this is the joy of hope and peace. Do you have peace of soul in times of darkness, in times of trouble, in times of persecution, when everyone else rejoices at your suffering? Do you have peace? If you have peace, you have the seed of joy that will come later.”

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

“Let us receive the special grace of this moment. We pause in reverent silence before this empty tomb in order to rediscover the grandeur of our Christian vocation: we are men and women of resurrection, and not of death. From this place we learn how to live our lives, the trials of our Churches and of the whole world, in the light of Easter morning. Let us not allow ourselves to be robbed of the basis of our hope! Let us not deprive the world of the joyful message of the resurrection! And let us not be deaf to the powerful summons to unity which rings out from this very place, in the words of the One who, risen from the dead, calls all of us 'my brothers.'"

--Pope Francis, Church of the Holy Sepulcher, Jerusalem, May 25, 2014

Reflection for Memorial Day

"No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends." --John 15:13

Every year on Memorial Day, we Americans take a break from our normal work routine to gratefully remember and honor all those men and women who have given their lives in military service to our country--those who have died defending our freedom. This annual holiday offers an opportunity to reflect on the true meaning of freedom, as our nation's great Founders understood this term.

Today we often think of freedom as the self-endowed, absolute and inviolable ability to do whatever we want to do, with no regard for an objective moral law. But this is an erroneous conception of freedom which is detached from any responsibility to God and to our fellow human beings, and if we all put it into practice it would result in social chaos and anarchy. By contrast, freedom properly understood is the ability to do what we ought to do--to choose good and reject evil, to live by the Ten Commandments and the teachings of Christ. Moreover, true freedom is a gift from our Creator, and it sets certain basic limits on human behavior for our own good. As Bill Donohue has clearly pointed out in his excellent book Why Catholicism Matters, our nation's Founders believed in "ordered liberty," that is, freedom to do the right thing in accordance with "the laws of nature and of nature's God."

We need to get back to this concept of ordered liberty anchored firmly in the objective and unchanging natural law established by our Creator. It is this concept and its implementation that has made us a great nation. Only if we understand and use our freedom properly will we return to greatness as a nation.

"Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace. Amen."

So Much for the "May Camelopardalids"...

...at least from my extremely limited perspective as a lone amateur astronomer who observed the night sky from about 8:45 PM to a little past 11 PM Friday evening from my home in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

Perusing my emails early Friday evening, I read an article from Astronomy magazine about a brand-new meteor shower predicted to occur that very night, so I jumped at the chance to witness it for myself. The new shower has been nicknamed the "May Camelopardalids" because the meteors would appear to radiate from a point in the northern sky in the large but faint constellation Camelopardalis the Giraffe (I can identify quite a number of the constellations, but haven't learned this one yet). The shower was caused by our planet Earth crossing through a stream of dust particles along the orbit of an obscure comet, 209P/LINEAR. The article predicted rates of anywhere between 100 and 400 meteors per hour in the early morning hours, which would have put it in a class by itself since the year's traditionally best meteor shower is the Geminids in December, which produce up to 120 meteors per hour under excellent conditions. So despite partly cloudy skies, I headed out to see if I could get at least a little slice of this spectacular show, keeping watch on the northern sky. However, I only saw two meteors radiate from the expected location, one at 10:18 PM EDT and the other at 10:23 PM.

Going to bed around midnight, I wondered what I would be missing in the early morning peak of the show. Apparently I didn't miss much, as other observers recorded just a handful of meteors early Saturday morning. See, for example, this image taken on the northern shore of Lake Erie from NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day website (note that the long bright streak across this image is not a meteor but the International Space Station passing through the field of view). So the expected show failed to materialize. But at least the astronomy professionals were correct that we would see a new shower, because we did. We mustn't be too hard on them for being so far off on the numbers, because even annually recurring meteor showers are notoriously fickle and hard to predict. They can be dazzling one year and boring the next, even if sky conditions are similar. More often, the opposite happens--an unusual outburst will occur entirely unpredicted, and only those who happened to be observing will see it. A good reason to observe on a regular basis, because you never know when you might be treated to something special.

So much for the "May Camelopardalids," at least for this year. Only time will tell whether this will develop into a major shower or sink into obscurity alongside the South Taurids and the Ursids. Despite the lackluster performance from this new meteor shower, however, I enjoyed looking at the stars and planets Friday evening. God's creation is magnificent and communicates to us His awesome power, glory, wisdom and intelligence, and above all His infinite love for us human beings, the masterpiece of His creative work, regardless of the occasion or time of year.

Quote of the Day

"In every human situation, marked by frailty, sin and death, the Good News is no mere matter of words, but a testimony to unconditional and faithful love: it is about leaving ourselves behind and encountering others, being close to those crushed by life’s troubles, sharing with the needy, standing at the side of the sick, elderly and the outcast...Love is more powerful, love gives life, love makes hope blossom in the wilderness."

--Pope Francis

ElectionWatch 2014: Gearing Up

With the big midterm Congressional and many state gubernatorial elections less than six months away, it's time to begin another ElectionWatch series here on my blog. Some readers may recall my previous ElectionWatch 2010 series that I ran four years ago leading up to the historic 2010 midterm elections, which resulted in a landslide victory for the Tea Party movement and for the traditional religious and moral values held by the great majority of the American people. Now it's time to prepare for another important election season that promises to be just as exciting and historic, if not more so, than the elections held four years ago.

Surveying the current American political landscape allows us to discern some striking similarities between now and four years ago. The red tide of Republicanism that swept America in November 2010 was largely driven by public anger and outrage with the Obama administration over its new healthcare reform law, the deceptively misnamed Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), colloquially referred to as ObamaCare, which was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Obama despite the loud objections of fully two-thirds of the American people. Thus the elections of 2010 became a referendum on ObamaCare, a massive and outrageously expensive piece of legislation that turned out to be little more than pork barrel for the abortion, pharmaceutical, and insurance industries and for our corrupt Democratic leaders who supported it. Just two years after Barack Obama had been elected to the White House by a landslide, Republicans took back the House of Representatives by a comfortable majority, increased their strength in the Senate, and took over more than half of all state governorships.

Now, four years later, the American people are once again angry with President Obama and his corrupt Democratic cronies, and for the same reason: ObamaCare. The difference is that now this disastrous law we never wanted is in effect and we the people are suffering all the consequences that President Obama and Senate Democrats persistently denied would ever materialize. Our freedom of religion, freedom of conscience, and freedom to make our own healthcare decisions are under attack as never before. Catholic hospitals are being forced to either perform or provide referrals for abortions. Health insurance plans must now include such population control items as abortifacients, contraceptives, and sterilizations, or they don't qualify as health insurance. Thousands of Catholic and Christian educational and charitable institutions, as well as secular business owners, are being forced to sue the federal government to avoid paying massive fines for refusing to violate their religious and moral principles. Many business owners can't afford to comply with the new health insurance regulations, so they're cutting back on employees and work time. Many good doctors are suffering pay cuts and can't afford the new insurance plans either. The states can't afford to administer ObamaCare, and those attempting to do so will soon be going bankrupt. Millions of us have lost our existing health insurance coverage and can't afford the ObamaCare premiums. Millions of us are in the "coverage gap" and don't qualify even for Medicaid, leaving us just one health emergency away from financial ruin. And tens of millions of us are watching our hopes for a decent and prosperous future fade away under the onslaught of higher healthcare costs, more taxes, new bureaucratic regulations and a national debt spinning hopelessly out of control.

Bottom line: ObamaCare is destroying America, and we know it. We've been lied to. We've been cheated. The truth is getting out and hitting home. If our country is to be rescued from annihilation, ObamaCare must be repealed. But it can't be repealed unless we have a majority of Tea Party leaders in both houses of Congress. We already have a Republican majority in the House, which we held on to and slightly increased in the otherwise disastrous (and fraudulent) 2012 election. Our job now is to take back the U.S. Senate. We're only six seats away from regaining control of the Senate. We must win at least those six seats. And we have a good chance of doing just that. Incumbent Democrats in the Senate are in big trouble precisely because of their unstinting support for ObamaCare. Their constituents of both parties are angry with them. Thus, barring massive voter fraud (which negatively affected the outcome of the 2012 elections), I think it's safe to predict that we will win a majority of seats in the Senate this November, and that most of the races will be landslide victories for the Tea Party.

Let's keep our nation in our prayers as we head towards the 2014 elections. While we have good reasons to be optimistic, we must remain vigilant. The corrupt Democratic politicians who have saddled us with ObamaCare won't give up without a fight, and they will certainly throw every dirty trick in the book at us in their desperate, last-ditch attempts to retain power. However, our country desperately needs better leaders--good Christian, pro-life leaders who will uphold and protect our God-given rights and liberties and govern our nation in accordance with the Constitution as the Framers intended. We have many such leaders in the House and state governorships already. We just need more of them in the Senate. The only way to get them in is to vote for them. And only American citizens can (legally) vote. So, if you're an American citizen, start preparing now for this important election. Make sure that you're registered to vote; that you clearly know the candidates' positions on the issues, especially on abortion, religious liberty, and ObamaCare; that you go to the polls on November 4, 2014; and that you vote pro-life, pro-liberty and against ObamaCare. We can't afford to lose this time!

Stay tuned for continnuing coverage of the decisive 2014 midterm elections.

Quote of the Day

“You can’t evangelize without dialogue. It’s impossible because you must begin from where the person who is to be evangelized comes from. And this is so important. ‘But father, we waste so much time because every person has his or her own story, he or she comes with their own ideas…’ And, time is wasted. More time than God wasted when he created the world and He did it well. Dialogue. Spend time with that person because that person is who God wants you to evangelize. It’s more important to give him or her the news about Jesus, but according to who he or she is -- not how it should be, but how he or she is right now.”

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

"Throughout the history of the living, the origins of anything new have always been small, practically invisible, and easily overlooked. The Lord himself has told us that 'heaven' in this world is like a mustard seed, the smallest of all the seeds (Mt. 13:31-32), yet contained within it are the infinite potentialities of God. In terms of world history, Jesus' Resurrection is improbable; it is the smallest mustard seed of history.

"This reversal of proportions is one of God's mysteries. The great--the mighty--is ultimately the small. And the tiny mustard seed is something truly great. So it is that the Resurrection has entered the world only through certain mysterious appearances to the chosen few. And yet it was truly the new beginning for which the world was silently waiting. And for the few witnesses--precisely because they themselves could not fathom it--it was such an overwhelmingly real happening, confronting them so powerfully, that every doubt was dispelled, and they stepped forth before the world with an utterly new fearlessness in order to bear witness: Christ is truly risen."

--Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth--Holy Week: From the Entrance into Jerusalem to the Resurrection (Ignatius Press, 2011), pp. 247--248

A Timeless Message from Our Blessed Mother

Today is the feast day of Our Lady of Fatima, an optional memorial on the Roman liturgical calendar. Today we commemorate the appearances of our Blessed Mother to the three shepherd children of Fatima, Portugal in 1917, a private revelation recognized by the Church as authentic. We are coming up on the one hundredth anniversary of these apparitions, which offers an opportunity to reflect on the mixed bag of our contemporary world. A lot has changed in the in the years since then, but some things, like sinful human nature, have not changed. Many great technological changes and scientific advancements have completely transformed our world for the better, yet the widespread denial and rejection of objective moral and religious truth in the name of false ideologies and philosophies has caused and is continuing to cause great suffering and misery for millions of people--as was happening in the early twentieth century with World War I and the godless ideology of Communism.

The core message of Fatima--prayer and fasting for the conversion of sinners and for peace in the world--is even more pertinent for us today than it was when first delivered nearly one hundred years ago. Our twenty-first century world, marked by selfish individualism and the "globalization of indifference," is in desperate need of prayer, fasting, conversion, and peace. Let this feast day be a reminder to us to heed Our Blessed Mother's request to pray our Rosaries and give little things up each day for the conversion of sinners and for peace in the world. And let's remember that this all starts right inside of each one of us; we must look honestly into our own hearts and identify the areas in our own lives where we ourselves need conversion. Only when human hearts change will our world really change for the better. Prayer and fasting are the means God uses to change hearts in every age. He can do it again in ours. So let's get to work!

Have a blessed feast day!

Quote of the Day

"The essential condition to preserve this gift [of counsel] is prayer. We always come back to the same subject: prayer! But prayer is so important. To pray with the prayers that we all know from childhood, but also to pray with our own words. To pray to the Lord: “Lord, help me, counsel me, what must I do now?” And with prayer we make room for the Spirit to come to help us at that moment. To counsel us on what we must all do. Prayer, never forget prayer! Never! No one, no one is aware when we pray in the bus, in the street: we pray in silence with our heart. Let us take advantage of these moments to pray, to pray that the Spirit will give us this gift of counsel."

--Pope Francis