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Showing posts from May, 2014

The BEST answer to the gun problem in the USA and elsewhere

A Letter to Silence and Solitude - IgnitumToday : IgnitumToday

One of the cabins at Dumoine Lake Cottages Every year since I've been a priest, I head off to an outfitters camp in Northwestern Quebec for five days of 'silence and solitude'. It's my most cherished week of the year - free of phones, radio, tv, internet - nothing but peace, quiet and solitude in which to pray, read, write, and relax. Hopefully my new assignment will permit me the time to do it again this year... although with three parishes to cover, it might be a little more difficult to schedule than in years past. Still, I hope to get there again (even if only for a couple of days) as there's no place better to recharge one's spirit (at least for me) than aside a tranquil lake far away from noise, business, and people. Where's your quiet place? A Letter to Silence and Solitude - IgnitumToday : IgnitumToday

Justin Trudeau cites fathers influence on his abortion stance | CTV News

But Justin... abortion is not a right enshrined in either the Constitution or the Charter of Rights. It is simply something that was permitted under statute and then granted universal status when the SCC struck down the law based on its unequal application among the provinces. Statements like this remind me that while Liberals trumpet his paternal roots, Justin is also the son of Margaret Sinclair-Trudeau-Kemper too. He is not the intellectual equal to Pierre Elliot just because he is his son. The manner that he has mishandled this issue is proof enough of that! Justin Trudeau cites fathers influence on his abortion stance | CTV News

Tweedledum and Tweedledee: Bishop Fred Henry (Calgary) shares his thoughts on the Federal parties stance on abortion rights

“Tweedledum and Tweedledee”  My mom often used the expression - “tweedledum and tweedledee”. My dad explained that it mean t  - “six of one, half a dozen of the other.”  For example, two matters, persons, or groups can be very much alike, as in Uncle George says, he's not voting in this election because the candidates are tweedledum and tweedledee . I later discovered that these terms were actually invented by John Byrom, who in 1725 made fun of two quarrelling composers, Handel and Bononcini, and said there was little difference between their music, since one went "tweedledum" and the other "tweedledee." The term gained further currency when Lewis Carroll used it for two fat little men in Through the Looking-Glass  (1872). Reflecting on our federal political leadership, I thought that the terms applied rather well to Prime Minister Harper and leader of the opposition, Thomas Mulcair. The former has repeatedly said that he doesn’t support re-openi

Gunman dead, three Mounties injured after St. Paul, Alberta shootout | CTV News

Police are investigating whether the death of a Catholic priest is "related to the events" that left one suspect dead and three RCMP officers injured after a gunfight broke out in St. Paul, Alta. on Friday night. In a statement on Saturday, RCMP confirmed that the Catholic priest’s death was being treated as a homicide, and investigators were probing any possible links to a shootout that occurred on the same night. "The RCMP continues to investigate this homicide in an effort to determine whether the victim’s death is related to the events that resulted in the injury of three RCMP members and the death of the suspect," police said in a statement. Read more:  http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/police-probing-whether-death-of-priest-related-to-shootout-in-alberta-1.1815646#ixzz31PUYBZM8

Not posting because I'm under the weather.

Sorry folks for the lack of posts lately but I've been under the weather and stuck in bed for the past few days. It looks like this will continue for a few more days if my experiences this morning at trying to accomplish a few things is indicative of my state of health. It seems I still have a little ways to go before I'll be solidly on my feet. Hopefully I'll be 'back on the road' and posting by the middle of this coming week. Thank you for your patient understanding Fr. Tim

The End of Protect the Pope

This article raises some valid points about the relationship between levels of clerics and how a 'ministry of blogging' comes under that umbrella. But the real reason it caught my eye was the header that accompanied the blog site that comments on this dynamic: De Omnibus Dubitandum Est: ...the existential consequences of assuming Cartesian doubt, the method of modern philosophy, to its last consequences. It's not often one runs into an author who's raison d'être is to oppose Cartesian philosophy... at least not since the end of the 18th century! Where else but the internet could you find the Cartesian method condemned by using the Latin phrase which roughly translates to 'Doubt Everything'? The End of Protect the Pope

What Happened to Switzerland | Web Exclusives | Daily Writings From Our Top Writers | First Things

In 2008, bioethicist Yuval Levin in his book Imagining the Future: Science and American Democracy identified a subtle but momentous shift in the philosophical driver of the West:   The worldview of modern science . . . sees health not only as a foundation but also a principal goal, not only as a beginning but also an end. Relief and preservation—from disease and pain, from misery and necessity—become the defining ends of human action, and therefore of human societies. At first blush, this seems a minor matter. Who doesn’t want to alleviate suffering and promote the general welfare? But read the above quote again. That reasonable approach to the problem of suffering is not the attitude Levin describes. Rather, it seems to me that he detected a fundamental paradigm shift driving us away from the reasonable mitigation of suffering in favor of a Utopian—and ultimately dangerous—eliminationquest that threatens the unique dignity of man and relativizes the importance of human life. Cl