Al Kresta's Blog, page 12

Pope Francis Embraces a Modern Leper and the World is Drawn to its Knees

The moving encounter caught the attention of those in the square. The scenes of the tender embrace went viral.
By Deacon Keith Fournier
11/8/2013
Catholic Online ( www.catholic.org )



Pope Francis kissed a modern day leper on Wednesday. The whole world is being drawn to its knees. I believe this a move of the Holy Spirit. I only pray that Christians will respond and seize the moment.Pope Francis, a man who moves in the Holy Spirit, responded to Jesus Christ on Wednesday. He left the pope mobile and embraced this man with the affection of a spiritual father. He kissed him with paternal tenderness. He recognized his beauty as a gift from God, the source of all beauty. He saw this man as the Father does and drew us to our knees. In so doing, he calls us all to conversion. 
 



VATICAN CITY (Catholic Online) - On Wednesday, November 6, 2013, Pope Francis traveled through the crowd of the faithful gathered in St Peters square to hear his weekly catechesis. This is a tradition of the modern popes. Each, in their own manner and style, teach the Christian faithful on an aspect of living the Christian life.

The whole world paused in the face of an authentic witness of God's love and Mercy on Wednesday. The gates of hell were rattled. We all beheld the very heart of the Gospel of Jesus Christ spoken in a language much more powerful than words.

Francis usually delivers a simple and popular exposition on living the Christian life. He is a pastoral pope, a man who speaks in simple words and prophetic action. On Wednesday, after his beautiful address, he followed his customary practice of driving through the crowd in an open pope- mobile.

This is an evangelical Catholic Pope. He is a man deeply in love with Jesus Christ, the Living Word - and deeply in love with the people whom Jesus loves. He speaks with words and actions. Like his namesake, he is a word walking, a living testimony to the prophetic meaning of the Christian message.

Pope Francis saw a man in the crowd who was severely disfigured by neurofibromatosis. This is a debilitating disease which has devastating effects. The effects can include intense pain and suffering, vision problems, learning impediments, cancerous lesions and severe disfigurement.

The physical effects can sometimes render those afflicted with such severe disfigurement that people recoil from even being around them. This reaction is much akin to the reaction people had toward lepers during the life of Francis of Assisi. He was among them. He hated lepers and avoided them at all cost.

However, during the movement of God's grace which occasioned his profound conversion and commission, Francis confronted a leper. He was moved by the love of God to embrace and kiss this leper. When he did, the leper was revealed as Jesus Christ.This changed Francis and spawned a movement which changed history.

Read the rest here: http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=53083

Oregon Rations Medicaid Coverage for Cancer Treatments, Assisted Suicide is Okay

by Wesley J. Smith | Salem, OR | LifeNews.com | 11/8/13 12:50 PM

As I have discussed here previously, the first state to explicitly ration Medicaid–an integral feature of all single payer systems–the screws against terminal cancer patients. Now, the issues is gaining wider discussion in Oregon.

From an opinion column published in the Statesman Journal by Peter J. Pitts:

In August, Oregon’s Health Evidence Review Commission issued an update to its guidelines for providing cancer treatment to low-income individuals covered by the state Medicaid program. These new guidelines require that Medicaid deny coverage for certain cancer treatments for patients that have been deemed “too” sick, haven’t responded well to previous treatments, or can’t care for themselves.
Through these new rules, Oregon state bureaucrats are severely restricting access to care and dooming potentially thousands of local patients to a premature death…It’s true that for some late-stage cancer patients, the odds are long than any additional treatment can help. But without access to the latest that medical science has to offer, a patient’s survival rate simply drops to zero.
These guidelines dictate that Medicaid only provide “palliative” care – painkillers, acupuncture treatments, wheelchairs, drugs for nausea, and the like.

It’s death panel time!

Oregon’s new Medicaid guidelines take treatment decisions out of the hands of doctors and patients and put them in the hands of distance state bureaucrat willing to cut costs no matter the human toll. It’s the practice of cost-centric controls over patient-centric care.

In the new USA, these kind of death maneuvers will always be done in the bowels of the deep bureaucracy without direct representational democratic involvement.

Read the rest here: http://www.lifenews.com/2013/11/08/oregon-rations-medicaid-coverage-for-cancer-treatments-assisted-suicide-is-okay/

Lawsuit divides town which inspired classic novel To Kill a Mockingbird

Pulitzer-winning author Harper Lee accuses local museum in Monroeville, Alabama, of exploiting her literary fame
 theguardian.com,
Friday 1 November 2013 13.23 EDTHarper Lee, pictured when receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2007. Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
More than 50 years have passed since Harper Lee published To Kill a Mockingbird, her gripping novel about racial injustice in deeply segregated Alabama. Now the town where Lee was born and raised, and which served as the inspiration for her best-selling book, has once again become the scene of an unsettling legal dispute that has divided the community.
This time Lee, who at 87 is profoundly deaf and almost totally blind, is not the author of the story but – on the surface at least – its protagonist.

In a move which has shocked Monroeville, Lee, who resides in an assisted-living facility in the town, is bringing a lawsuit against the local museum, accusing the small, not-for-profit institution of exploiting her fame and the prestige of her Pulitzer-winning book without offering compensation. The museum is fighting back, condemning Lee’s lawsuit as “false” and “meritless” and warning that the legal action could destroy an institution that honours the author's legacy and provides an economic boost to the town.

It is the kind of ugly public dispute that Lee, an intensely private figure who has spent her life avoiding the spotlight, might have been expected to avoid. Unsurprisingly, Monroeville has been awash with with rumour about whether Miss Nelle, as the author is known locally, was personally responsible for the decision to sue the museum.

The answer to that question is complicated, but it appears to involve Lee’s 102-year-old sister, Alice, and a close associate, an attorney who happens to be married to a relative of Truman Capote.

Read the rest here: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/01/harper-lee-monroeville-museum-lawsuit-mockingbird?CMP=twt_gu

Can You Have Religion Without God? Ronald Dworkin and a religious worldview for secularists

BY MOSHE HALBERTALOCTOBER 26, 2013The New RepublicRonald Dworkin’s profound and moving final book, now published posthumously, is unique among the works that he wrote throughout the decades of his extraordinarily creative life. Anyone who read Dworkin or heard him lecture knows that he possessed a brilliant and elegant mind, conceptually sophisticated, analytically astute, and always at the service of a moral, legal, and political cause.   BARUCH SPINOZASpinoza, a seventeenth-century Jewish-Dutch philospher, walks book in hand through Amsterdam while being ostracized by the Jewish community.But this book is marked by a different tone and style. It does not present a set of arguments that aim at changing beliefs and convictions; instead it conveys a philosophical, even spiritual sensibility. Its ambition is to effect not a shift in any particular position but a transformation in the way we see the world and in the stance we take toward the most basic features of our existence. The incisive qualities of Dworkin’s mind are evident in various arguments that appear throughout the book (especially in the chapter titled “Religious Freedom,” which examines the nature of the constitutional protection of religion), but the main endeavor of Religion without God is to convey an attitude—not so much to argue as to “show,” to set before the reader a certain philosophical temper and to share a particular stance. Religion without God: what can such a stance mean? Is God not constitutive to religion in the way that liberty is constitutive to liberalism? Could we imagine a book called Liberalism Without Liberty? And if we can isolate the stance implied by Dworkin’s paradoxical title, what is gained by calling it “religion”? There is, moreover, a deeper cultural puzzle. Dworkin stood for many years at the center of contemporary American liberalism as perhaps its most important and eloquent defender.  Though it stoutly defends freedom of religion, contemporary liberalism has taken a hostile, or uneasy, or indifferent attitude toward the religious project. Its exponents usually give the impression, and gladly, that they are religiously tone-deaf. (This is a matter of temperament, which is not intrinsically related to argument as such. Wasn’t the civil rights movement of the 1960s religiously inspired? But experience has taught us that in philosophy and in politics temperament is of at least equal importance to argument.) Why, then, should Dworkin have “tainted” his thinking by associating himself with such a sensibility even as he asserts his atheism? Read the rest here: http://www.newrepublic.com/article/114898/ronald-dworkins-religion-without-god-reviewed-religious-worldview

The Would-Be Philosopher-King

Michael Ignatieff, former Canadian Liberal political leader exposes his soul and confesses hubris while he heads back to school...

The Chronicle of Higher Education
Nov. 4, 2013

Ignatieff offers various explanations for his readiness to be swept up: patriotism, ambition, a longing for significance, familial obligation. All played a role, but perhaps none larger than hubris. "What's complicated about hubris is that if you knew what you were in for, you'd never do it," he says. "Blindness—and it was a moment of blindness—is the necessary condition for much human achievement."
He looks out the window onto his small balcony awash in sunlight. "So I'm divided between being glad that I was so hubristic and being appalled." He turns back to me. "I mean, who did I think I was?"

Rene Johnston, Toronto Star, Getty images Michael Ignatieff left Harvard and reinvented himself as a politician. A surreal rise and dizzying fall ensued. Here he gives a speech to Canada’s Liberal Party.
Read the rest here: http://chronicle.com/article/The-Would-Be-Philosopher-King/142715/

Egypt: Christians threaten to walk out on constitution rewriting over Islamic law dispute

Jihadwatch.org

The Christians know that Islamic law enforces their subjugation, instituting a system of legalized discrimination and harassment. "Egypt: Christians threaten to walk out on constitution rewriting over Islamic law dispute," from the Associated Press, November 7 (thanks to Twostellas):

CAIRO — Christians on a committee rewriting Egypt’s constitution threatened to walk out Thursday after disputes over portions dealing with Islamic law.Egypt’s ultraconservative Al-Nour party — which has one member in the 50-person panel — has been pushing for adding an article defining Islamic, or Shariah, law, which critics warn could allow for stricter interpretations of what Shariah is later.

For AP, you're "ultraconservative" if you want Sharia, and "far-Right" if you oppose Sharia.

Read the rest here: http://www.jihadwatch.org/2013/11/egypt-christians-threaten-to-walk-out-on-constitution-rewriting-over-islamic-law-dispute.html

Today on "Kresta in the Afternoon" - November 7, 2013

Talking about the "things that matter most" on November 7

4:00 – Kresta Comments

4:20 – Evangelist Billy Graham turns 95: Looking at his relationship with Catholics, Blessed John Paul II and his influence on American culture
Billy Graham, the famed evangelist and reverend turned 95 today. For decades, U.S. Presidents have sought spiritual council or spent time with the celebrate Reverend Billy Graham. To celebrate his lifelong career as a spiritual adviser to several presidents, his hundreds of crusades all across the world and his work as a Christian evangelist, more than 800 invited guests will celebrate with his tonight. The event willalso debut his video message titled "My Hope America." The message is scheduled to air on numerous national networks including FOX News tonight. We talk with his biographer, Dr. William Martin.

4:40 – Of Course Euthanasia is About Mental Illness
It really is astounding how the media continue to assume that assisted suicide/euthanasia is only for the terminally ill. Here’s the latest example: Hemlock Society founder Derek Humphry was in Arizona advocating for assisted suicide for the mentally ill. Our guest, bioethicist Wesley Smith, says he is convinced that the grass roots of the assisted suicide movement are enthusiastically on board with the eventual spread of euthanasia to mentally ill people. He joins us.

5:00 – Vatican directs faithful not to host Medjugorje 'seers'
The Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has instructed the Catholic faithful not to participate in events in which the "seers" of Medjugorje promise apparitions of the Virgin Mary. For years, the group of people who have reported visions of the Blessed Mother at Medjugorje have made public appearances in churches, announcing in advance that "apparitions" will take place. Archbishop Gerhard Ludwig Müller, the prefect of the CDF, has called for an end to church sponsorships of these events. We address the Vatican statement with the Vice-President for Theology at EWTN, Colin Donovan.

5:40 – Kresta Comments

Open response to: “Overpopulation: Should America have a one-child policy?

By Anne Roback Morse   Population Research Institute               Last Tuesday, the Washington Times published an article by Joseph Cotto entitled, “Overpopulation: Should America have a one-child policy?” Despite the provocative title, the article does not present a stimulating thought-experiment, but rather a series of half-truths and inconsistencies with dangerous implications. 
Because such half-truths have been at the ideological root of every forced abortion this century, we at Population Research Institute drew up a list of the claims made in the article—and countered them with facts to expose their fallacies.

Claim 1: Cotto commences his article by citing Michael Arth, a controversial gubernatorial candidate who advocated the imposition of birth credits. Arth argued that although human innovation often “increases under pressure,” the pressure which inspires it is worse than the innovation itself. The article cites, “One of the most innovative periods of human history was WWII...However, we also had the wholesale destruction of cities, untold suffering and the massacre of at least 60 million people.” Reply: World War II was indeed a period of both ingenuity as well as suffering. However, Mr. Joseph Cotto confuses correlation with causation. Ingenuity and suffering are not inextricably related. There have been periods of misery without ingenuity, and periods of ingenuity without suffering. For instance, the Silicon Valley technology boom of the 1990s did not produce “misery and sorrow for the sake of innovation.”
Read the rest here: http://pop.org/content/open-response-“overpopulation-should-america-have-one-child-policy

Overpopulation: Should America have a one-child policy?

Photo: Associated Press Joseph CottoTuesday, October 29, 2013 - The Conscience of a Realist by Joseph CottoWashington Times

OCALA, Fla., October 29, 2013 — Today, America is more secular of a nation than ever before.
With secularism’s rise has come a scientific wave — some might even call it a tsunami — that is answering life’s toughest questions in a fact-based fashion. Of course, scientific inquiry has no shortage of foes; the most prominent of whom tend to be hardline followers of supernaturalist religions.
 Beyond the stereotypes of Bible thumpers and pseudo-intellectual creationists, though, one sector of modern science tends to attract derision from across the board. This, as more than a few might have guessed, is overpopulation.

The very concept of overpopulation is so controversial that some deny its existence. These people run our society’s socioeconomic gamut; from poor immigrants to public intellectuals to high-profile politicians. Their overarching claim is that as populations grow, human innovation will increase; thus creating a higher quality of life.

What can be said about their perspective?

“There’s no doubt that innovation increases under pressure,” urban designer and public policy analyst Michael E. Arth tells The Washington Times Communities. In 2010, he launched a quixotic bid for Florida’s Democratic gubernatorial nomination. While this was not a success, it set the ball rolling for discussion about the role special interests play in politics.

Read more: http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/conscience-realist/2013/oct/29/should-america-have-one-child-policy/#ixzz2jvaeu5ED
Follow us: @wtcommunities on Twitter

CDF bars participation in events assuming truth of Medjugorje

The complete letter from the papal nuncio
to the Catholic Bishops in the US
Photo from Medjugorje TodayWashington D.C., Nov 6, 2013
11:14 am (EWTN News/CNA)
 At the direction of the Vatican's head for doctrine, the apostolic nuncio to the U.S. has written a letter stating that Catholics “are not permitted” to participate in meetings which take for granted that the supposed Marian apparitions in Medjugorje are credible.

“The Congregation (for the Doctrine of the Faith) has affirmed that, with regard to the credibility of the 'apparitions' in question, all should accept the declaration … which asserts: 'On the basis of the research that has been done, it is not possible to state that there were apparitions or supernatural revelations,'” Archbishop Carlo Vigano wrote in an Oct. 21 letter to the bishops of the U.S., sent to the general secretary of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
“It follows, therefore, that clerics and the faithful are not permitted to participate in meetings, conferences or public celebrations during which the credibility of such 'apparitions' would be taken for granted.”

Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, the papal nuncio to the United States, is in effect the Vatican’s US ambassadorEWTN News confirmed that the letter was sent to every diocese in the U.S.

Read more: http://www.ewtnnews.com/catholic-news/US.php?id=8768#ixzz2jvW9GdHY