 
October 26, 2003
November 02, 2003
November 09, 2003
November 16, 2003
November 23, 2003
November 30, 2003
December 07, 2003
December 14, 2003
December 21, 2003
December 28, 2003
January 04, 2004
January 11, 2004
January 18, 2004
January 25, 2004
February 01, 2004
February 08, 2004
February 15, 2004
February 22, 2004
February 29, 2004
March 07, 2004
March 14, 2004
March 21, 2004
March 28, 2004
April 04, 2004
April 11, 2004
April 18, 2004
April 25, 2004
May 02, 2004
May 09, 2004
May 16, 2004
May 23, 2004
May 30, 2004
June 06, 2004
June 13, 2004
June 20, 2004
June 27, 2004
July 04, 2004
July 11, 2004
July 18, 2004
July 25, 2004
August 01, 2004
August 08, 2004
August 15, 2004
August 22, 2004
August 29, 2004
September 05, 2004
September 12, 2004
September 19, 2004
September 26, 2004
October 03, 2004
October 10, 2004
October 17, 2004
October 24, 2004
October 31, 2004
November 07, 2004
November 14, 2004
November 21, 2004
November 28, 2004
December 05, 2004
December 12, 2004
December 19, 2004
December 26, 2004
January 02, 2005
January 09, 2005
January 16, 2005
January 23, 2005
January 30, 2005
February 06, 2005
February 13, 2005
February 20, 2005
February 27, 2005
March 06, 2005
March 13, 2005
March 20, 2005
March 27, 2005
April 03, 2005
April 10, 2005
April 17, 2005
April 24, 2005
May 01, 2005
May 08, 2005
May 15, 2005
May 22, 2005
May 29, 2005
June 05, 2005
June 12, 2005
June 19, 2005
June 26, 2005
July 03, 2005
July 10, 2005
July 17, 2005
July 24, 2005
July 31, 2005
August 07, 2005
August 14, 2005
August 21, 2005
August 28, 2005
September 04, 2005
September 11, 2005
September 18, 2005
September 25, 2005
October 02, 2005
October 09, 2005
October 16, 2005
October 30, 2005
November 06, 2005
November 13, 2005
November 27, 2005
December 04, 2005
December 11, 2005
December 18, 2005
January 01, 2006
January 08, 2006
January 15, 2006
January 22, 2006
January 29, 2006
February 05, 2006
February 12, 2006
February 19, 2006
February 26, 2006
March 05, 2006
March 12, 2006
March 19, 2006
March 26, 2006
April 02, 2006
April 09, 2006
April 23, 2006
May 07, 2006
May 14, 2006
May 21, 2006
May 28, 2006
June 04, 2006
June 18, 2006
June 25, 2006
July 02, 2006
July 09, 2006
July 16, 2006
July 23, 2006
July 30, 2006
August 06, 2006
August 13, 2006
August 20, 2006
September 03, 2006
September 10, 2006
September 24, 2006
October 01, 2006
October 22, 2006
October 29, 2006
November 12, 2006
November 26, 2006
December 10, 2006
December 17, 2006
February 25, 2007
March 04, 2007
March 11, 2007
|
|
 |
 |
|
--- Saturday, November 22, 2003
Cryptic Cartoon Causes Koranic Commotion
This is too bizarre not to post...
WorldNetDaily reports that the Council on American-Islamic Relations is demanding an apology from Johnny Hart, the creator of the comic strip B.C., after alleging that Hart made a "cryptic" slam against Muslims in one of his recent cartoons. You be the judge, I guess (Nov. 10 strip).
See the Movie, Read the Book
I just got back from seeing The Gospel of John at the movie theater. Ultimately, I'm afraid that it is doomed to be overshadowed by next year's The Passion of Christ, the controversial film created by Mel Gibson. Still, John was a pretty good, pictoral look at the fourth book in the New Testament, but I have to say that it didn't stand out as unique from any other straight-from-Scripture film about the Good News. Jesus was played (as convincingly as is possible on screen) by an actor who at least looked Jewish, which is a good change from the typical fare. But showing a movie that is a near-verbatim narrative of the book of John can't quite capture the depth of God's Word. However, it does a decent job of portraying the message of salvation, which is one we ALL need desperately.
Focus on the Family's Plugged In says: "All told, The Gospel of John provides a fresh, powerful and honest look at the life of Christ, promising rich reward for those willing to withstand its long presentation (the movie's pace may be more suited to episodic Bible studies than a night out at the movies). If any viewer is left doubting that Jesus Christ was and is the Son of God, it is no fault of The Gospel of John."
--- Friday, November 21, 2003
A Hef-ty Burden Indeed
Did Hugh Hefner really win the culural war for modesty? Though I won't say the fat lady has completely exhausted her vocal chords, it's a humbling question -- answered, perhaps by another: How shocking is Playboy today?
The most common first response could be the most telling. Playboy, shocking? you ask.
Just this week, millions of TV watchers (yours truly NOT included, thankfully) were mesmerized by Britney Spears flaunting her selling points on national television. And if that wasn't enough skin for the viewing pleasure, Victoria's Secret showcased its latest -- um, fashion? -- in a prime-time special on Tuesday. That these shows get airtime is plenty indicative of the culture; but now they're being broadcast on network television during "family" viewing hours. And it goes without mentioning what kind of trash is glorified in R-rated movies (and some PG-13s), on cable, in countless Playboy clones and other magazines, and certainly on the Internet.
This constant barrage of sensual imagery bludgeons a man's soul. Even worse, it sends mixed and deceitful messages to pure-hearted, modest, and humble women (who are the truly attractive ones). Have Hugh Hefner and his media progeny successfully killed the soul of the culture? I don't think so -- but they may have helped put it on life support.
Pushing the Lord off the Cliff
David Limbaugh writes:
In the Moore case you have a federal court telling a state court that it can't symbolically recognize the God of the Bible as the source of our laws (or otherwise). In the Massachusetts case you have a state court ruling that the Bible can't be the source of our laws. I think the latter has even graver implications. Well put. The more we set aside the moral foundation of the law (of God and of the conscience He's created), the more baseless rationale is used to open the doors to all kinds of immorality. It's a natural enough progression, but we have to stand strong to stop the dominoes from continuing to fall.
Lightning (and Meteor) Strikes Twice
Remember the meteor that supposedly wiped T-Rex and pterodactyl from the real Jurassic Park? Apparently, that was nothing compared to another rock some couple hundred million years earler. That meteorite, circa 251,000,000 BC, supposedly wiped out about 90 percent of life on earth (and presumably a substantial number of entire species). What's amazing to me is just how quickly evolution rebounded to replenish the planet with so many new kinds of creatures during that time. It doesn't quite add up -- I guess journalists aren't the only ones who work better under deadline.
--- Thursday, November 20, 2003
Jihad of the Dove?
In an interview with Larry Elder, author Robert Spencer debunks President Bush's stated position that Islam is a peaceful religion, hijacked by terrorist extremists.
There are millions of peaceful Muslims ... but the fact is that radical Muslims are using core texts of Islam that are deeply rooted in Islamic theology, tradition, history and law to justify their actions, and those radical Muslims are able to recruit and motivate terrorists around the world by appealing to these core Islamic texts. This is such an important message. Many Muslims practice a more passive approach to daily living, but just because we like them better doesn't mean they're the true adherents to their religion. There are pro-abortion, pro-gay-agenda "Christians" who don't believe Jesus was Messiah, but just because they get treated better by the media doesn't make them committed followers of the Lord. The bottom line is that "jihad of the sword" is hardly heretical to the Quran, and most Islamic organizations won't deny that fact.
A Walk up the Slippery Slope
Ross MacKenzie tracks how low we've sunk in the marriage debate, vis a vis this week's court ruling. "And so now, with our knowledge superior to that of the Founders," he says, "knowing what they did not know, and could not - a Massachusetts court has directed its fire at an institution created for the procreation of children and their healthy upbringing by a woman and a man."
It bears recalling how numerous cultural factors have chipped away at the sanctity of -- well, pretty much everything -- in the past several decades. Whereas family, marriage, life, and liberty used to be the crown jewels of American society, now we hold dear "equality" and "diversity" and "expression." We should certainly protect the latter, but God forbid it comes at the expense of the former.
Stupid Is as Stupid Does?
Editing God out of the history books really doesn't leave much left. Craig McMillan writes:
The America that I know became what it is in large part because of the thrift, energy and intellect of its Puritan founders. Their lives were a direct outgrowth of their Christian faith. They passed the same traits and faith on to their children, and so on down the line. That is why it is commonly said that we are a Christian nation. It has less to do with our church attendance than with the values we bring to the workplace and the public square.
--- Wednesday, November 19, 2003
And from the Left...
USA Today: "The civil rights of individuals across the USA are violated routinely because of sexual orientation. States can end that discrimination by ensuring that their laws treat gay and heterosexual couples equally."
Ralph Neas, People for the American Way: "This is not only a victory for gay and lesbian couples in Massachusetts, but also an important affirmation of the changing attitudes toward equal rights for all Americans, regardless of sexual orientation."
ACLU: "In a practical sense, today's ruling will end discrimination against gay couples regarding pension benefits, medical insurance, hospital visitation and inheritance rights. The Massachusetts court's decision to no longer deny the right to marry is clearly the way to go, the ACLU said, rather than to proceed with a dangerous federal constitutional amendment that would, by attempting to ban same sex marriages and destroy all of the domestic partnership laws and other measures that state and local governments have passed to protect same-sex relationships."
Eileen McNamara: "The right to a marriage license is a matter not of morality or of religion or of ethics but of equality under the law. In the end, it was that simple....In a historic decision, made more compelling by Chief Justice Margaret H. Marshall's powerful, spare prose, the state's highest court reduced the polarizing issue of gay marriage to the straightforward constitutional question before the justices."
Andrew Korfhage: "If Bush and right-wing members of Congress seek to circumvent the courts with a constitutional amendment, the institution of marriage may prove a destabilizing force in our society for a long time to come."
More from the Right...
Terrence Jeffrey: "Yet, if God is not the ultimate author of our law, who will be? Whoever has the power to impose their will on others. This week it was four Massachusetts judges -- who manhandled marriage, denying the truth that it is a match made in heaven."
Maggie Gallagher: "Four judges in Massachusetts, ruling in a same-sex marriage case, have decided that children don't need mothers and fathers, that marriage has nothing to do with getting children what they need. Marriage is a passing plaything of the latest fashionable ideology, a toy for adults with graduate degrees to tinker with, at their pleasure."
Stanley Kurtz: "Far from being a great victory, Goodridge is a serious tactical error on the part of the gay-marriage movement. By pushing gay marriage on a country that still opposes it, the gay-marriage movement has set itself up for at least the possibility of defeat. It would have been much smarter to wait....Given the wording of Goodridge, I think the court will be hard-pressed to do anything less than insist on full gay marriage, whether the legislature goes along with it or not."
Albert Mohler: "The Massachusetts court has turned aside millennia of moral wisdom and would lead that Commonwealth--and by extension the entire nation--into a brave new world where marriage is merely a contractual relationship between individuals and homosexuality is completely celebrated as a lifestyle."
Cal Thomas: "Marriage was not invented by the postal service as a convenient way to deliver the mail. It was established by God as the best arrangement for fallen humanity to organize and protect itself and create and rear children."
The Civil-Union War
The Washington Post reports:If the ruling goes into effect six months from now as the court envisions, and if same-sex couples carrying Massachusetts marriage licenses settle in other states, it probably will be only a matter of time before someone goes to court claiming the right to have a same-sex marriage recognized outside the Bay State, legal analysts on both sides of the issue said. It seems likely that the Defense of Marriage acts on the books in 37 states will end up providing the necessary conflict to take the issue to the Supreme Court.
Slope Is Still Slippery
The court decision in Massachusetts yesterday confirms some of our worst suspicions about the aftermath of the Supreme Court's ruling this summer in Lawrence v. Texas, which overturned a prohibition on sodomy. Yesterday's nonsense bucks public opinion that is overwhelmingly opposed to same-sex unions, and it spits in the face of the moral foundation of marriage -- and of our nation. True as that may be, the "family" itself is not really in any more or less danger. For there will always be (Lord willing) disciples of Christ who understand the spiritual significance of a man and woman joining together in service and fellowship and bringing offspring into the world to do the same. What's truly under fire is the conscience of society itself, for if culture redefines family and morals as "anything goes," then there really isn't a basis for anything.
Here are some more news, opinions and statements on the case from Focus on the Family, American Values, Family Research Council, The Washington Times, and MarriageDebate.com. I'll probably be posting more of these links throughout the next couple days....stay tuned.
--- Tuesday, November 18, 2003
Deja Vu, Again?
Sunday's Washington Post contained an interview with Yasser Arafat's new puppet...er, Palestinian prime minister Ahmed Qureia. The face may be new, but the rhetoric is pretty much exactly the same as Qureia's short-lived predecessor Abu Mazen. We're not terrorists...it's all the fault of the Zionist aggressors...we will make the sacrifice for peace...how noble we are to offer to stop blowing up innocent civilians...yada yada yada.
Qureia said:
We should leave this meeting with an explicit message to the peoples on both sides that we will start working together to put an end to the suffering. We will reach a cease-fire agreement and start negotiations to end the conflict and live as good neighbors....The real problem is Israel, not Arafat....When we reach a cease-fire, I am committed to it. I am committed to the road map. I am committed to all the agreements that have been signed. I recognize Israel but we want the Americans to tell the Israelis to stop the settlements and the wall. Line for line, these statements could have been made by Abu Mazen during his limited tenure as PM. For that matter, they could be made by Arafat himself, who has been known to shift his views depending on which microphone he's speaking into.
Change is absolutely impossible in this region until the PA is willing to put action to words and use their resources to fight terrorism instead of fund it. I won't hold my breath.
More on the Massachusetts Case
You can read the full text of the Mass. court's decision here.
Not surprisingly, in that decision you'll find a lot of familiar vocabulary from recent Supreme Court rulings and liberal mantras that distort terms like "dignity" and "equality."
Mass. Edges Toward Gay Marriage
After months of waiting to see how the Massachusetts high court would respond to a same-sex marriage case, the verdict is in: gay couples have the constitutional right to wed in Massachusetts. Lawmakers in the state must now create legislation based on the court's decision, which could end up providing "marriage" licenses to same-sex couples.
If nothing else, this might put an imminent deadline on the passage of a marriage amendment. It's disgusting that it will take amending the Constitution to protect the definition of matrimony from being re-written, but the results seem almost inevitable if we put faith in the court system to do its job.
--- Monday, November 17, 2003
No Amendments to Marriage
Jeff Jacoby writes:
Race is immaterial to marriage, but sex -- gender -- goes to its very essence. And just as it was a perversion of marriage for the law to force race into the equation, it would be a perversion for the law to force gender out of the equation.
Gays and lesbians must be treated with dignity and compassion, but we must also insist on a universal truth: Marriage is for joining what is different, not for adding like to like. Indeed.
No-Love Charity?
A Unitarian minister in Great Britain is accusing Billy Graham's Samaritan's Purse organization as being "right wing and racist." The big crime? Delivering shoeboxes full of food and toys to children in war-torn nations and including -- gasp! -- story books of the Gospel! Clearly in the name of humanity and civil rights, these starving kids should slap a big fat "Return to Sender" label on these gifts in protest of their overt religious underpinnings. Seriously now, these children probably are not concerned whether this week's meals come from caring Christians or not. And Samaritan's Purse hardly forces them to accept Christ before giving them physical nourishment. Providing food for the body and for the soul is the definition of charity.
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
Articles
|
