Dear Reader:
I’ll be starting a new part of this column involving two different pincer movements—all for your enjoyment, and possibly understanding. The first will be, hopefully, one or two quotes that have caught my fancy and may catch yours as well. Secondly, and more importantly, sometime in the not too distant future, I will be inking my thoughts on the subject of ‘marriage’. I know that everyone out there has a perfect one, and one of my sons has made the comment that I really don’t know what I’m talking about---but I think I’ll take my chances.
So two quotes I’ve run across in the past few days, the first being an old Turkish saying which was applied at one point in time to T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia fame). He being a Colonel at the time and having a love of the spotlight and yet not liking some of the side effects of fame, was admirably quoted in a Turkish newspaper circa 1919 in this way, “He had a genius for backing into the limelight”. I thought it was clever.
Number two is from George Orwell, who wrote “1984” among other novels. He remarked of all saints, and in particularly Ghandi, ‘…that all saints should be judged guilty until proven innocent.”
On a more serious note and because it is Lent this is from Benedict XVI titled:
The Temptations of Christ
The temptations are a descent into the perils besetting mankind, for there is no other way to lift up fallen humanity. Jesus has to enter into the drama of human existence, for that belongs to the core of his mission; he has to penetrate it completely, down to its uttermost depths, in order to find the “lost sheep”, to bear it on his shoulders, and to bring it home….At the heart of all temptations is the act of pushing God aside because we perceive him as secondary, if not actually superfluous and annoying, in comparison with all the apparently far more urgent matters that fill our lives. Constructing a world by our own lights, without reference to God, building on our own foundation; refusing to acknowledge the reality of anything beyond the political and material, while setting God aside as an illusion—that is the temptation that threatens us in many varied forms. Moral posturing is part and parcel of temptation…It pretends to show us a better way, where we finally abandon our illusions and throw ourselves into the work of actually making the world a better place. It claims, moreover, to speak for true realism: What’s real is what is right therein front of us—power and bread. By comparison, the things of God fade into unreality, into a secondary world that no one really needs. God is the issue: Is he real, reality itself, or isn’t he? Is he good, or do we have to invent the good ourselves: The God question is the fundamental question, and it sets us down right at the crossroads of human existence.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Sunday, February 14, 2010
The Natural Law Part V A
God and Reason
God is a designer. According to Aquinas this is one of the reasons we know him to be a person, has an intellect, and is spiritual. An animal will build because of instinct but has no concept in regards to abstract ideas, or building based on abstract ideas.
The concept that man has a ‘spirit’ means he is immortal. Included in that spirit are some of the things we have talked about before such as creativity, free will, reason, the ability to see outside of oneself, i.e., to reflect. Death is the breaking up of something into its parts. At death the body separates from the soul, eventually decomposing into the basic of elements (sometime remind me to tell you about one of my Bio professors and his yacht named PSNOTCH). A spiritual thing cannot die for it has no parts. The one thing that the autonomous individual cannot do is put him or herself out of existence.
Evolution? We are not some indiscriminate and meaningless product of evolution. Each one of us, and it should give us great joy, is the result of a thought from our Creator, our Manufacturer if you will. Each one of us is willed, loved and is necessary. We are body and soul.
Evolution is about the development of parts, specifically in our case, the human body. It is not proven that the human body developed from an amoeba, which sprang from two chemicals joined together through a bolt of lightning. The soul cannot evolve. It has to be the product of the immediate, the creative thought of God. The human soul has no parts and because it has no parts it cannot evolve.
Natural Law is given to each of us so that we can achieve our goal, the purpose for our very being. For and to this purpose the soul is eternal and will live forever.
The only basis for asserting a human being's transcendency rights against the state is that we are created in the image and likeness of God. Why? Because every state has and will go out of existence. The soul is the opposite, eternal, and will live forever.
God is a designer. According to Aquinas this is one of the reasons we know him to be a person, has an intellect, and is spiritual. An animal will build because of instinct but has no concept in regards to abstract ideas, or building based on abstract ideas.
The concept that man has a ‘spirit’ means he is immortal. Included in that spirit are some of the things we have talked about before such as creativity, free will, reason, the ability to see outside of oneself, i.e., to reflect. Death is the breaking up of something into its parts. At death the body separates from the soul, eventually decomposing into the basic of elements (sometime remind me to tell you about one of my Bio professors and his yacht named PSNOTCH). A spiritual thing cannot die for it has no parts. The one thing that the autonomous individual cannot do is put him or herself out of existence.
Evolution? We are not some indiscriminate and meaningless product of evolution. Each one of us, and it should give us great joy, is the result of a thought from our Creator, our Manufacturer if you will. Each one of us is willed, loved and is necessary. We are body and soul.
Evolution is about the development of parts, specifically in our case, the human body. It is not proven that the human body developed from an amoeba, which sprang from two chemicals joined together through a bolt of lightning. The soul cannot evolve. It has to be the product of the immediate, the creative thought of God. The human soul has no parts and because it has no parts it cannot evolve.
Natural Law is given to each of us so that we can achieve our goal, the purpose for our very being. For and to this purpose the soul is eternal and will live forever.
The only basis for asserting a human being's transcendency rights against the state is that we are created in the image and likeness of God. Why? Because every state has and will go out of existence. The soul is the opposite, eternal, and will live forever.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Capitalism and Freedom
Individual liberty can only thrive when accompanied by economic freedom.
Milton Friedman
For those of you who think we are under assault--we are. Please read 'Capitalism and Freedom' by the same author. I am starting to put out a book list for those of you who are interested and have not stopped learning. Friedman's book is just the first. The second book is Hayek's 'The Road to Serfdom'. Part V A hopefully will be out tomorrow.
Do Good, avoid evil.
John Paul II
Milton Friedman
For those of you who think we are under assault--we are. Please read 'Capitalism and Freedom' by the same author. I am starting to put out a book list for those of you who are interested and have not stopped learning. Friedman's book is just the first. The second book is Hayek's 'The Road to Serfdom'. Part V A hopefully will be out tomorrow.
Do Good, avoid evil.
John Paul II
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