Haitian Relief Efforts

The expected death toll in Haiti now is over 100,000 people. This catastrophe calls out to the human heart to respond. The best thing you can do to help in Haiti right now is pray and send money. The American Center for Law and Justice recommends three charities on their website. One, Operation Blessing, spends 99% of donations on direct aid and is experienced in disaster relief. They have earth moving equipment, mobile kitchens, etc. to get assistance to the people quickly. Check it out here.

Our Lady's Apparitions in Kibeho

In 1981 Our Lady appeared to three young people in Kibeho, Rwanda. Ultimately seven would claim visions, but it is the visions of the first three young people which have been approved by the Church. Mary warned about the Rwandan massacre to come when corpses would lie in the streets and the rivers would run with blood. Ultimately over a million people were murdered in the bloody genocide. One of the visionaries was killed in the massacre. Another joined a contemplative order of nuns and the third remains as a lay person in the parish. Mary's message was consistent with the messages of Lourdes and Fatima: prayer and conversion are the road to peace. At the time Rwanda was a peaceful country, a paradise. No one could except an authentic messenger of God could predict the horrors that would come a decade later. And yet Mary showed them to the young people.

“In July, 1982, and the following months, August 15, 1982, the Assumption, and again on September 4th and in January 1983, Our Lady showed us a lot about the war. Often she talked in general that the world is bad, that people do not have love, contrary to what God shed his blood for; Our Lady insists as well on love. Our Lady talked about and showed us some visions of reality where people killed each other, blood running, fire burning on the hill, mass graves, skulls, beheaded bodies, skulls put apart....

“Our Lady appeared here to remind us what we have forgotten....Her message: she insisted on prayer and on conversion, on penance and humility.”

Pray the rosary daily for peace in the world! Read more here and here.

Why do they hate home schooling so much?

The answer is easy. They can't control it. Robin West recently did a hatchet job on "The Harms of Home Schooling." West is a law professor at Georgetown University. (Why am I not surprised when the attack comes from a teacher at a so-called Catholic university which should be a defender of the primary rights of parents over the education of their children?) West bemoans the fact that many Protestant fundamentalist parents are home schooling and doing it "with little or no oversight from public school officials, who in some states need not even be notified of the parents’ intent to homeschool."

Wow! what a horrifying situation! Public school authorities who often expose children to the glories of sodomy and abortion are being taken out of the loop by concerned parents. But West is appalled that home schooling has become a "widespread and thoroughly privatized educational practice that devolves full responsibility for a child’s education to whatever parent wants to claim it, which is not only legal, but virtually unregulated as well."

For lawyer West's information this was the same situation that existed in this country for two centuries when parents, not the state, taught their children to read and write and apprenticed them to learn a trade. She is also horrified that some of these parents might use the Bible as their primary curriculum. (Another widespread practice in Colonial and post Colonial America.)

West goes on to make a number of outrageous claims about "unregulated" home schooling, from the allegation that home schooled kids are likely to be physically abused (parents of the Columbine students might have an interesting take on this statement) to the claim that parents aren't qualified, curricula is probably deficient, kids miss out on being socialized, and that "poor" fundamentalist parents are probably economically depriving their children as well.

In view of massive research on the success of home schooling and the fact that children at home outperform their institutionalized peers by wide margins, West's article, which provides NO documentation to back up her outrageous allegations, is irresponsible. She wants state regulation by educational bureaucrats who in many places have failed miserably and are producing functional illiterates.

But I suspect West's real agenda isn't so much with what parents are teaching their children, but what they aren't. She espouses her agenda by quoting an opponent of homeschooling. "Robert Reich has persuasively argued, curricular review would give the state a way to ensure that the academic content is such as to protect the children’s interest in both acquiring the necessary skills for active, autonomous, and responsible citizenship in adulthood, and in being exposed to diverse and more liberal ways.

Ah! There you have it. Children schooled at home partly to protect them from "diverse and more liberal ways" that include teaching them to put condoms on bananas, reading about Heather's two mommies, safe touch and sex ed programs that sexualize them from Kindergarten, how to pray like a Muslim, etc. must be liberalized. As always, the foxes want authority over the chicken coop for the benefit of the chicks.

If you're interested in homeschooling you can read West's article here and a response by PhD Brian Ray here.

A little humor with a message!

As I've said before, the Arian heresy was spread with hymns that taught heretical positions. But two can play that game and music can be used to spread the truth too. This song addresses the bogus health care bill with humor. Pass it on.

Treat Terrorists Like Terrorists

Terrorists who attack this country should be treated as enemy insurgents, not U.S. citizens. The insanity of giving them Miranda rights, etc. is lunacy. It is also nuts to give them a platform to spout their hatred and encourage other like-minded enemies of the U.S. to follow their example. Those behind the 9/11 atrocity should be tried in a military tribunal like other war criminals. Trying al-Qaeda's confessed 9/11 terrorist mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four al-Qaeda cohorts in New York City puts Americans there at risk from additional attacks. Can you imagine the horror of a mass transit bombing during the trial. How about a terrorist attack in one of the tunnels around the city as a show of terrorist power. It could happen any time, but anyone who doesn't see the potential for inciting another New York attack is blind.

This administration is soft on terror and murderous to unborn babies. Who do you think is a bigger threat to the country?

Read about the petition and then sign it. Deal with these war criminals in a military tribunal where they belong.

Tens of Thousands Sign Petition Urging Holder to Move KSM Trial from New York

HUMAN EVENTS Petition to Move KSM Trial From NYC

Who Benefits from Global Warming?

December was REALLY COLD! Did you notice? It was the 14th coldest in the contiguous United States for the past 115 years. It also set records in other parts of the world. Check out examples here and here and here.

Obviously one month does not a climate make. But what does? I get into arguments with global warming hysterics who insist that temperatures at different places don't matter. But of course they do. The aggregate of temperatures around the world over time is part of the data. After all, it's the collection of weather measurements from many places that indicates what's happening on the planet. Unless, of course, there's a global armpit to measure the "planet's fever".

Anyone with half a brain and a little life experience (even a non-scientist)recognizes variations in climate from year to year. Many scientists have associated warmer periods on the earth with high sunspot activity and cooler periods with low activity. The theory that mankind is responsible for temperature variations is typical of the godless sense that man is the center of the universe. Forget it, folks, we're not. My theory that sin causes global warming by opening fissures from hell is just as likely as all the nonsense about greenhouse gases.

Read up on the biosphere. Scientists find that when CO2 increases, vegetation grows a lot faster. It's self-correcting. I don't know if man will ever have the capacity to destroy the planet. I doubt it, because I think the Lord will return before he lets that happen. But I know one thing for sure. It's frigid out there and if you don't like it go somewhere else because no matter what you do it'll still be cold ouside.

As for "scientists" with their computer models who tell us what will happen ten or twenty years down the road, I'll believe it when the weatherman can accurately predict what will happen next week. The last time I depended on a ten day forecast for a travel destination, it showed sunny and warm temperatures which didn't materialize until the day we were returning home. Cold and rainy with occasional cloudy would have been more accurate. And you think these guys can predict the demise of the planet in a century?

A lot of people benefit from hysteria. Al Gore is a global warming profiteer making millions off the hysteria he hypes around the world.

Be a good steward of the earth; live a virtuous life. That's the best insurance for saving the planet. It closes up the fissures from hell that poison the air. That's the only real "man-made" global warming.

Below is a video of testimony from Al Gore to Congress. I was disappointed with the failure to really grill Gore. His non-answer illustrates that the best defense is a good offense. The Congresswoman should have pursued the question and asked if he was willing to have an independent financial audit of his books. Does the non-profit pay him a salary for serving the company on its board or for other duties associated with his involvement? You can funnel all your money into the non-profit and get it back again. Planned Parenthood, after all, calls itself a non-profit as well. How much do they pay their staff? The fact is that Al Gore has increased his personal wealth from a millionaire to a multi-millionaire since leaving Congress. Where is the money coming from? How much is he really making from selling his green snake oil?

Victory in the battle of Thiberville

Fratres reports the good news.

After discussions with Apostolic Nuncio, French bishop backs off. Deo Gratias.

Winter Weather and Global Warming

Who'd-a-thunk it?

As far as I know Elvis wasn't Catholic, but he loved to sing gospel music. I think that's how he started out actually. While you listen to this, say a Hail Mary for the repose of his soul.

Women in Combat: It's Immoral!

Remember when Congress was debating the issue of women in combat? Remember when they voted to allow women in and near combat zones? No?

Neither do I. The debate never took place except to some degree during the Equal Rights Amendment battle. So how did we end up in the situation where women are dying and have been taken prisoner during wars on foreign shores?

It's the morphing principle. If you can't get what you want through legitimate debate, use the courts or authority figures or anything else to morph your position into the mainstream.

The debate on women in the military needs to happen for the sake of the children. (The left is always using "the children" to promote what they want, but seldom seem to care about the real interests of children.)

Touchstone Magazine has a great article, Mothers in the Line of Fire in the January/February 2010 issue. Andrew Sicree examines the issue from Catholic morality and concludes that, "Not only is it immoral to conscript women of child-bearing age, but it is also immoral to permit them to volunteer to serve in combat positions, except in strictly defensive situations such as might be found in 'home front' scenarios wherein there is no longer any safe place to retreat."

Check out the article and enter the debate.

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