|
Table of
Contents
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. |
Muslim Immigrants to Europe are a Huge Problem because of Religion - (Note: this brief essay grows out of a section taken from a Council of Foreign Relations publication on Sharia Law (publication #13552). The most relevant paragraph is set out below:
“Conversion by Muslims to other faiths is forbidden under most interpretations of sharia and converts are considered apostates (non-Muslims, however, are allowed to convert into Islam). Some Muslim clerics equate this apostasy to treason, a crime punishable by death. The legal precedent stretches back to the seventh century when Prophet Mohammed ordered a Muslim man to death who joined the enemies of Islam at a time of war. However, because apostasy is not a crime under the criminal codes of Muslim states, generally the murtad (apostate) is not subject to any criminal sanction. “The Quran contains a provision that says ‘‘he who has embraced Islam and then abandons it will receive punishment in hell after Judgment Day,” says M. Cherif Bassiouni, an expert on Islamic law at DePaul University College of Law, and therefore there is no punishment on earth. But traditional scholars, in Bassiouni's opinion, misinterpreted early practices of the Prophet Mohammed and consider apostasy a crime punishable by death. They give religious converts a grace period of up to ten days to reconsider their decision before the judgment is entered.”“ )
Applying this section on Sharia to the situation in Europe, it becomes immediately apparent that the Muslim population there will never be absorbed into a majority possessed of a bland Judeo Christian culture, where actual religious practice, for most is an afterthought. When young people are taught that death awaits them if the stray from Islam and when the alternative has few enthusiastic adherents, they are not likely to stray.
If you combine the above reality with the fact that Muslims tend to have large families, the fate of Europe is sealed unless something dramatic is done. What actions might be taken?:
1) Tolerance courses might be installed in schools where the parts of the Quran which are really intolerant are specifically condemned. Students might also be required to sing songs extolling religious tolerance.
2) Traditional European religion might be re-emphasized. This is what Pope Benedict advocates. The idea here is to fight fire with fire. If the Muslims are going to teach a strong version of their faith then Christians and Jews should be equally strong in their religious practice.
3) Encourage Christian and Jewish women in Europe to have more children. This might require some major changes in public policy. The pill might again be a prescription medicine that is very difficult to obtain. Give all families a $100,000 check upon the birth of their fourth child.
4) Look into a policy of expulsion if a statement of religious tolerance is not signed annually by all citizen and legal residents over the age of 14. The statement would say “I will not attend any religious service where intolerance toward other religions is preached or where temporal punishment is advocated for those who convert to another religion.”
These kinds of steps are positively offensive to anyone steeped in Western Civilization. However, the survival of Western Civilization may be at stake.
Ferdinand and Isabella, after the fall of Spain to Christian re-conquest, had originally hoped to have a multi-religious kingdom with Christians, Jews and Muslims living side by side, but within a few years it became apparent that separation would be required. Thus began the mass exportation of those who refused to accept Christianity. The Inquisition followed when Church leaders discovered that many of these “forced converts” had not truly accepted Christianity and were practicing their old religion in private.
It is possible that, if the sharia did not contain these intolerant punishments, and if Muslims had been able to migrate peacefully to Christianity (which was the new majority religion), the entire episode of exportation and inquisition might have been avoided. (Margaret MacMillan, author of the insightful short book Dangerous Games and a great historian, would likely advise against such “what if” historical speculation, but sometimes such urges are hard to resist.)
........... (Prepared by Hugh Murray on 10/7/2009)
Does Fr. Paul Coutinho Confuse Catholics about God’s Relationship with Man? - In early Oct 2009, Fr, Paul Coutinho, S.J. addressed a group of over 100 lay persons at St. Louis University High School in St. Louis. During that address, which focused particularly on the importance of Catholics thinking of God as “in” them as opposed to thinking of God as “with” them, he also said a few words on how to use this insight to better deal with sin, particularly those difficult repeat sins growing out of particular individual weaknesses.
Coutinho would have people focus less on their sinfulness. Instead he encourages man to think of God as “within” and suggests man deal with sinfulness by going forward with God in a more intense way. Coutinho finessed the need for serious individual encounters with personal sinfulness: examinations of conscience, confession, and a firm purpose of amendment.
What if man commits serious sin? Does God leave him? Is there a rupture with God? How does man visualize the break that the serious sin places between the sinner and God? If man says God is “in” rather than God is “with”, it is much harder for man to sense the break which the serious sin creates?.
Of course, man, like all created things, is dependent on God and can’t exist without God not just being present. God is in fact actively engaged minute by minute with maintaining each atom, molecule and cell throughout the universe - keeping all in continual existence. The correct image therefore is not God “in” us, but rather it is each of us totally enveloped “in” God. But this fact and image, of God as “creator” and “maintain-er” of all things, is not very useful when man contemplates his relationship with God as he moves through life - sometimes in a state of Grace and therefore close to God, and at other times in a state of serious sin and therefore estranged from God. Remember God gave man a free will and wishes that man use that free will to opt for God’s loving plan rather some selfish plan. Therefore the image of man as sometimes standing “with” God and sometimes standing ”apart” from God seems more useful than other images.
However, it is also important to remember that when Catholics go to Communion they actually do receive the second person of the Trinity inside themselves. The Church teaches the Persons of the Trinity are indivisible because of their Divine nature, so receiving the Son is receiving God. This fact tends to support Coutinho’s contention that Catholics should think of God “within”.
Finally, it is also true that St. Paul in his Epistles said he had certain weaknesses, and that because God was “with” him (some say the correct translation from the Greek is “God in him”) his weakness were overcome. So again Fr. Coutinho’s use of the word “in” might therefore have support from scripture.
So the final questions are these: Does Fr. Paul Coutinho’s construct help or hurt man’s understanding of his free will, his tendency to sin, and his need to maintain a good relationship with God? Does Fr. Coutinho’s approach help or hurt a man’s chances for salvation by suggesting man turn his attention away from his personal sin and instead focus intensely on God within? ..........(prepared by Hugh Murray on 10/17/09)
Certain Illogical Situations in America Must be Recognized - Sometimes stating the problem is the hardest step in solving the problem.
In America today there are several problems that need to be defined in hard hitting ways because such hard hitting definitions illuminate with sharp contrast the outlines of the problems and thereby clarifies everyone’s thinking about them. Now to some problems:
(1) The government has decided to establish retirement programs for the elderly. Social Security and Medicare are prime examples. Actuaries have known for years that the generous payments made under these programs use the receipts taken from workers within months of day they are deducted from their paychecks. This is not an actuarially sound; no one claims it is. But what is illogical is the failure of the government to encourage more births so there are more workers coming along to make social security and medicare payments. In fact, it’s even more illogical to allow the wholesale destruction of unborn children (literally millions per year) who had already been conceived. If these children were allowed to come to term the social security/medicare problem would be a small fraction of what it is today. This brings to mind another major illogical situation in America.
(2) The wholesale destruction of tens of millions of unborn children in America was authorized by unelected Supreme Court Justices who sometimes act with no regard for the wishes of the vast majority of Americans and occasionally act with complete disregard for the established moral frameworks western civilization has upheld for 2000 years. This “high handedness” has demonstrated itself on many occasions: bussing, judicially imposed local taxes, abolition of state control of pharmaceutical sales, the exclusionary rule on criminal evidence, quotas, etc. The founders never envisioned that such unchecked power would devolve unto these unelected officials. In fact it only devolved unto these people through an stealth power grab by this self same court in 1803. Some mechanism must be established so representatives of the people can reign in these justices when next they stray away from long accepted American values.
(3) Young people from age 4 to 20 desperately need more structure in their lives. All young people from whatever class or of whatever intelligence level are being cheated because they are allowed to dress sloppily, treat elders disrespectfully, play too many computer games, have to much idle time, etc. They need structure: participate in organized sports, learn difficult hobbies, study musical insturments, master a foreign language, learn to ask probing questions and think critically, etc. Of course, kids from broken families need an opportunity to be around functioning families and those of low intelligence need to be taught to do repetitive tasks. They need to be assured that jobs that require repetitive tasks are available when they reach adulthood.
(4) America has a large population of low intelligence workers who, once they are exposed to structured training in their youth, will be ideal for factory work that features simplified repetitive tasks . Therefore it is totally illogical for America to remove such jobs from America and if any such jobs have been removed from America said jobs need to be returned to America.
(5) America is a nation of nearly one half billion people. It is huge, 3000 miles by 1500 miles. The idea of running such a place, making all important decisions from one location, with fewer than 1000 people possessing any real power, is truly uncomprehensible. One would expect major waste, endless SNAFU’s, programs that work with varying degrees of efficacy in different regions, local leaders exhibiting animosity toward the central authority, peace in the regions being maintained by constant handouts to local governments, organized blocks, and the influential citizen or corporation, etc. The need to return more real power to the localities is obvious. This can only be measured by determining if local authorities have to power to ignore mandates from the center in certain policy areas (e.g. family law, transportation facilities, corrections, education policy, etc.) and to reserve for localities exclusive power to levy certain taxes (e.g. sales tax, value added taxes, property, etc.).
Lots of problem definition here; sorry little in the way of answers ..............
........................(prepared by Hugh Murrau on 12/11/09)
Rotary Invocation delivered 12/23/09 at the Clayton-Ladue Rotary - The songs of this season have varied histories. One of the oldest is “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” whose roots can be found in 5th century Christian writings and was fully formed and being sung widely by the 12th century.
This song is a plea to God that the Messiah be sent; Emmanuel being another word for Messiah. As you recall it reminds God of man’s fallen state. The song uses terms like “lonely exile”, “depth of hell”, and “gloomy clouds of night” to describe the situation that man faces. The song reminds everyone of Adam and Eve’s misuse of their free will, and it reminds that each man’s free will sometimes pulls him toward good but sometimes toward evil. The song also reminds God of His promises, delivered throughout scriptures, to send a Messiah to help man deal with his difficult, fallen state.
So what should the Messiah’s arrival mean to us today? Perhaps we should join in the Messiah’s work? For instance, when we give a gift should we also be making a silent commitment to help the recipient do good and avoid evil? When we receive a gift should we be saying silently to ourselves “I hope this friend will help me do good and avoid evil”?
Speaking of gifts, the Syberg restaurant has brought us the gift of good food so let us bow our heads and pray:
Bless us O Lord and these they gifts which we are about to receive from thy bounty through Christ Our Lord, Amen ............ (prepared by Hgh Murray on 12/20/2009)
Three Black Leaders Exacerbate and Accelerate America's Moral Decline - America today is noted for several types of moral decay.First, there is a coarsness regarding human life. Americans procure about a million abortions per year, and tentative discussion is heard about end of life issues. The term "death with dignity" is used by progressives to color discussion of physician assisted suicide. But politically sensitive persons, particularly politicians themselves, are very weary of these conversations because large numbers of voters are strong believers and understand that the Bible makes it clear that life is protected from conception to natural death. But one American politician is undeterred by these considerations. This politician, Barach Obama, when he was a State Senator in Illinois was chairman of a legislative committee that was in charge of considering a bill that would outlaw the practice of allowing babies, who happened to be born alive during late term abortion procedures in Chicago, to be starved to death. Of course, the entire Illinois Senate realized the bill had to come out of committee and it had to be passed. The result was the bill was removed from Obama's control and became law over his intense objections. The point here is not that the practice of starving babies had to be stopped - that's obvious. The point here is that Obama was/is obtuse, completely out of touch with moral reality. He is willing to push immorality to new heights. So how did he get elected President? The fact is the press did not adequately inform Americans about Obama’s immoral leanings.Second, financial professionals have become very greedy of late. All consideration of financial need has been replaced with desires to simply beat the next guy. A trader that makes a million when his counterpart across the street make two million is unhappy and will do anything to make three million next year. This process of “one ups-man-ship” was carried to it extreme when Stan O'Neal, the CEO of Merrill Lynch, the largest brokerage firm, decided to push and push for maximum profits by issuing as many highly profitable Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO) as possible. The result was over eight billion in profits one year followed by total obliteration of the company within 24 months. Stan O'Neal made a 74 million dollars bonus in 2006 at the height of the frenzy. This bonus was three or four times larger than that paid to any other CEO of any other CDO obsessed firm. In order to win big O'Neal had to push his people to get product to package up and sell; This caused Merrill investment bankers to push mortgage originators to make as many loans as possible, some good most bad. The risks were ignored, the consequences were not considered. The eventual pain for the whole country is being felt by every American today.Third, extra marital affairs are everywhere. Couples lived together, sometimes for years before getting married. Fifty percent of marriages end in divorce leaving unattached adults seeking new relationships which in itself leads to more stress on other marriages. Married people who have the freedom or money or both will sometimes seek other extra marital involvements. The whole scene is full of anguish, disease, stress, psychological pain to children, etc. Most people who engage in this behavior limit its extent. Most people convince themselves there is some form of real love in the illicit relationship. But a few people are so callow and callous that they are simply pleasure seeking with the maximum number of partners they can induce to lie down with them. The recent champion in this category was Tiger Woods. His sexual life involved a dozen, perhaps two dozen, partners many of whom report that he made them feel as though he wanted a long term relationship. All this activity by a man who not only was married but had youngsters. All this by a man who was hero to literally tens of millions of young people. This behavior was particularly destructive for young black males who already have a habit of shirking responsibility toward their girl friends, wives and children. When these marginal males see a hero behave irresponsibly they naturally feel it is ok for them to behave similarly. Obama, O'Neal and Woods are carrying American immorality to greater depths. Their behavior is not a difference of kind, when compared to other Americans, but it is a difference in degree. What they stand for is alarming and must be denounced forcefully by America's religious and ethical leaders.
................(prepared by Hugh Murray on 12/31/2009)
.............
.
..................
.
..................
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. This page hopes to bring a common
sense, old fashioned view to today's news. The comments displayed
on this page were prepared by
Hugh V. Murray, who can be reached at hvm@aol.com
|
.......