Tuesday, May 31, 2011

The So-Called "Professional Conservative Smart Set" ...

... can kiss my @$$.

Add George Will to my $h!+ list. Actually, he's been on there for quite a while with his elitist anti-Palin schtick, but this is just beyond the pale. Someone ought to remind George that it's baseball season, and that he should STFU and take in a game.

And Ross Douthat should really tell his buddy Marc Ambinder that he does Ross no favors by describing him in these terms: "... the professional conservative smart set (like The New York Times’s Ross Douthat)".

What a bunch of elitist douchebags.

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Friday, May 27, 2011

Miley Cyrus Hates Rick Santorum, Hearts Same-Sex Nuptials

I'm no fan (at least not anymore) of Rick Santorum, but this is just pathetic:
Even Miley Cyrus is getting in on the 2012 action. In a reaction to a recent controversy over retailer Urban Outfitters allegedly copying jewelry designs, Cryus last night aired her criticism of UO President Richard Hayne’s campaign contributions to former Senator Rick Santorum.

“IF WE ALLOW GAY MARRIAGE NEXT THING U KNOW PEOPLE WILL BE MARRYING GOLD FISH’ – Rick Santorum UO contributed $13,000 to this mans campaign” the singer and Hannah Montana star tweeted, in an apparent reference to the former Senator’s famous “man on dog” remark. Santorum is known for his conservative and often controversial opinions on same-sex marriage...
My Comments:
Awwww. Isn't that sweet. Now that she's too old for her younger Disney audience, Achey Breaky's offshpring knows which Divah-worshipping cohort it is that's going to be buttering her bread. Can you say FAAAAAAAABULOUS?!?!

Yeah, whatever, Hannah Montana. You're only one or two more "Hey, look at me!" titty shots and an alcohol-induced binge away from being as completly irrelevant as your Disney predecessor, Lindsay Lohan.

Hat tip: Creative Minority Report

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Author of Anti-Boehner Letter Exposed as DemoCath Hack

As if we didn't know it already:
Washington D.C., May 27, 2011 / 06:08 am (CNA).- The lead author of a letter criticizing House Speaker John Boehner on “matters of faith and morals” says the letter was a bid for dialogue, not a political stunt. But Dr. Stephen Schneck's own critics say he promotes a distorted version of Catholic social teaching.

Professor Schneck, who directs the Catholic University of America's Institute for Policy Research & Catholic Studies, was the top signer of a letter protesting Boehner's May 14 commencement speech at the institution where Schneck works as a political scientist.

[...]

The signers charged the House Speaker, himself a Roman Catholic, with ignoring “the teachings of your Church on matters of faith and morals as they relate to governance.” They said the speaker's voting record was “at variance from one of the Church’s most ancient moral teachings,” regarding the obligations of “those in power” toward the poor and vulnerable.

But this form of faith-based protest has opened up Schneck to criticism over his own approach to the Church's social teaching.

[...]

Professor Schneck is a member of the board of directors at Democrats for Life, an organization he describes as “fundamentally and wholly concerned with trying to overturn Roe v. Wade.”

He is also a board member of Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good. That organization has received funding from George Soros' Open Society Institute, which promotes abortion as a “reproductive right.”

Catholics in Alliance typically backs Democratic policies, presenting abortion as an issue that should be addressed by ending poverty. In 2009, Schneck joined a “Catholics for Sebelius” initiative, supporting an Obama nominee whose bishop told her not to receive Communion over her abortion record...


[More]
My Comments:
So, let me get this straight. Differences over matters of budgetary and fiscal policy at the federal level make Speaker Boehner persona non grata. But Kathleen Sebelius, whose abortion advocacy and history of cozying up to late-term abortionists is so extreme that her Bihsop has admonished her against receiving Communion, merits this hack's going to bat for her as a member of "Catholics for Sebelius".

That, alone, exposes the guy as a political hack, a two-bit liar, and a hypocrite, and his views on Catholic Social Teaching can be summarily ignored as far as I'm concerned.

JUST REMEMBER this rule of thumb: Allegedly "pro-life" Catholic Democrats are ALWAYS committed Democrats first and foremost. Their party and its political agenda trump their faith and their allegedly "pro-life" views EVERY TIME it is put to the test.

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Wednesday, May 25, 2011

"X-Cons" and the Future of Conservatism [UPDATED]

Mark Shea has commented on an excellent piece by Joe Carter at First Things, in which Joe seeks to define "Generation X" conservatives, who he labels "X-Cons".

Mark begins:
He has been one of the few voices in the conservative movement to speak out of actual conservative values and not out of the Consequentialism that dominates the Thing that Used to Be Conservatism. So I was interested in his description of "X-Cons", the rising generation of conservatives (so-called) who have been coming of age in the past decade. I think his description is accurate, rather depressing, and a further proof that Chesterton is right when he says that each revolutionary movement is a reaction to the last revolution--and that it typically knows what is wrong but not what is right. I appreciate Carter's clear-eyed analysis and suspect that he, like me, is not altogether thrilled that this is the desperate pass in which the Thing that Used to be Conservatism now finds itself.
Later on, Mark continues:
X-Cons know little about history and their deepest influence is disk jockeys, who "taught us X-Cons to appreciate confirmation of our political views." The perfectly reasonable thing to ask in light of this crushing diagnosis is, "What, precisely, is being conserved by such a 'conservatism'?" A conservatism that knows nothing of engagement with ideas outside the Talk Radio Noise Machine (including engagement with ideas from its own intellectual history) and which has learned, as it's primary lesson, "to appreciate confirmation of our political views" is a conservatism that is intellectually barren and open to manipulation by demagogues who flatter its adherents and teach them to remain safe in the echo chamber.
Mark goes further in his assessment of "X-Cons" as the dupes of demagogues:
When Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck are your intelligentsia and Buckley is a sort of a ghostly eminence gris you no longer bother listening to, one must again ask what, exactly, is being conserved by such a conservatism. Much that bills itself as anti-elitist is just a celebration of intellectual laziness and a resentment of people who have done the hard work of thought. Yes, there are pointy headed intellectuals who pride themselves on their learning. That's not an excuse to be a wahoo who prides himself on his ignorance.
Mark concludes his analysis of Joe's piece lamenting Joe's acknowledgement of the fact that "X-Cons" will soon displace the generation that came before us. Joe writes:
• X-Cons will soon be replacing the Boomers as the dominant cohort within the movement. We’ll be fielding presidential candidates in 2016 and dominating elections in 2020. We are, for better and for worse, the future of the movement. And of America.
... and Mark responds:
Bleak words indeed...
My Comments:
First, let me note that I tried to leave my thoughts in comments on Mark's blog, but the commenting tool Mark uses rejected the comment as too voluminous. Rather than breaking it up into several comments, I decided to blog my view on the matter here.

While I commend Joe on his piece at First Things, I call B.S. on at least parts of Mark's analysis of Joe's piece, and ESPECIALLY on some of the commenters who have responded favorably to Mark's analysis by blaming the so-called "X-Cons" for the commenters' decisions to continue to support the party of abortion-on-demand.

The "X-Cons" aren't responsible for "the Thing that Used to Be Conservatism" (hereafter, "the Thing") - in fact, we are increasingly skeptical of "the Thing" and especially the Republican Party claiming the mantle of "the Thing". As evidence, I submit my own blog as well as a piece today at National Catholic Register by Pat Archbold (recently described by one of Mark's sycophants as a "Republican shill").

No, the folks responsible for bringing us huge deficits, Wilsonian foreign policy, and consequentialism dressed up as "the Thing" were decidedly NOT members of the "X" generation, but were baby boomers and even members of the so-called "Greatest Generation". Given that fact, Mark's assessment as "bleak words indeed" of Joe's acknowledgement of the rise of the "X-Cons" to replace the previous generation seems completely without merit. Surely we can't do any worse with respect to "the Thing" than the generations that have come before us. In short, given our increasing distrust of what "the Thing" has become and the party that champions it, it is the "X-Cons" who are the antidote to "the Thing", not the purveyors of it.

In addition, rather than criticizing the "X-Cons" for rejecting elitism and embracing what they see as middle-class authenticism, why not ask whether the elites have actually served them well and, if the answer is "HELL NO!" (which it most assuredly is), whether there are better alternatives for leadership from among the "riff-raff" who actually share the values of the "X-Cons"? Mark asks what is it that is actually being conserved? Well, if you ask me, the traditional family values of protection of life, protection of the institution of the family, hard work, integrity, loyalty, etc., etc., are being protected far more on the front porches, parish halls, and town halls of flyover country than they are in the halls of academia and, yes, even on the pages of National Review. Maybe "X-Cons" see the people Mark derides as base and demogogic as being the actual preservers of the values we hold dear (i.e. they're the ones doing the "conserving" these days), as opposed to the new generation of Buckleys who view us as so much white trash and instead embrace The One.

(You'll forgive me if I don't take seriously the criticisms of Bill Buckley's sole offspring aimed at a mother of five who has not only lived out her pro-life credentials and put them into practice, but who has placed herself into the arena rather than carping from the sidelines and living off daddy's reputation. Elites, indeed. And while the average "X-Con" is probably unfamiliar with Russell Kirk, I think you'd find that Russell Kirk would not have been unfamiliar with, and might even have approved of, the views of many typical "X-Cons".)

So, let me reiterate that I find Mark's assessment, in which he chooses so-called "X-Cons" as the object for beating on some of his favorite hobby horses, ridiculous. And let me extend that, as well, to those comments at Mark's blog from folks who just cannot bring themselves to be "conservative" because of the alleged influence of the "X-Cons". The guys who vote Democrat long after they should have stopped aren't voting Democrat because of the influence of the "X-Cons" and those who have shaped their thought; they continue to vote Democrat because they continue to treat differences over fiscal and budgetary matters as if they were matters of Catholic dogma, while giving short shrift to the holocaust of the unborn and the coming crisis the Church will face once same-sex marriage becomes the hammer for beating the Church into compliance with the social agenda of the left. In short, they are shaped by a culture of materialism moreso than they are a culture of life. (This final criticism by me is aimed at some of those commenting at Mark's blog, not at Mark himself.)


UPDATE (26 May)
For the record, I am not anti-intellectual, by any means. In fact, I'm quite proud of the fact that I have a law degree from a top-10 law school at a university founded by, arguably, this nation's most intellectual President. But I don't believe that much "conserving" is going on these days in the halls of academia or in the pages of the sorts of publications that the hoity-toity tend to patronize.

Sufice it to say that, if I were to hold to the views that most graduates of top-10 law schools hold, I would acutally have LESS claim to objective truth (which, in my view, is what conservatism is about) than the weekly-mass-attending guy in flyover country with only a high school diploma working an hourly 9-5 job to ensure that he can support his family of 6 and struggle to send his kids to Catholic school. I'd gladly vote for that guy to represent me over the typical graduate of a top-10 law school ANY DAY.

And, since Mark alludes to Buckley in his post, let us not forget that it was the man himself who once said that he would rather entrust the government of the nation to the first 400 people in the Boston phone book than to the Harvard faculty.


UPDATE #2 (27 May)
Commenting at The American Catholic, American Knight absolutely nails it with respect to X-Generation conservatives:
Speaking as a so-called X-con, a label I like even less than Gen X I can say that we are a generation that is resistant to be defined by these labels. Although the X factor has some truth to it. We are far less homogenous than previous or subsequent generations. We are a relatively small generation sandwiched between two generations of collectivists, yet we are probably more powerful because we are nimble, intelligent rather than educated, conservative rather than Republican, creators more than consumers, religious more than spiritual, leaders more than followers.

We did grow up knowing that we survived the most dangerous place in the world, our own mothers’ wombs only to face being burned alive by the Soviet nuclear threat. Yet most of us came of age when it was Morning in America again. Have you noticed how much happier the music of the 80s is compared to the whinny, sentimental, depressing tone of today’s so-called rock and even the corporate bubble gum pop? Our musicians for the most part played real instruments. Even the movies were better, now we can only remake 70s and 80s shows, comic books and video games. Creativity is dead.

We experienced a sanitized Catholicism and yet more of us hear the Tridintine Mass and thinks the liberals in the Church are no threat because they’ll be dead and gone soon and Gen-X priests are true soldiers of Christ. We are the triumphant remnant of orthodoxy.

Our politics are reactionary because the work of the 20th century to destroy America from within and merge her with the USSR, which was supposed to come to completion during WWIII in our years of coming of age DID NOT happen. The timetable moved because morning came to America and the masters of the universe where not expecting it. Although the 80s and 90s seemed prosperous, we knew that the bedrock of society had been eroded and we wanted it restored. We have to battle two large anti-American, globalist, socialist age cohorts. One that has practically destroyed this country, both the Rs and the Ds and the other which is their spawn and far more violent and nihilistic and way, way dumber and more manageable by the cult of personality.

We are hopeful and yet totally aware that we are being screwed. If this generation cannot restore authentic conservative principles and return American to where the right is traditional and the left is libertarian and they both operate under the Christian God; and the liberals are dead, in prison or exiled, then no discussion will be necessary because America will be no more.

Trying to fit a generation like that into a neat little box like the hippies before us and the socialists after is going to prove to difficult for anyone, even us...

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Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Shooting Yourself in the Foot Isn't Generally Fatal ...

... unless your foot happens to be in your mouth.

Shortest and worst presidential campaign EVER!!!

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Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Amy's New Travel Blog

Check out Amy Welborn's new travel blog, Booked:
Booked came about this way.

I was sitting around a couple of months ago – early 2011- mulling over future writing projects, actual and proposed. I wasn’t really jazzed by any of them, and spent a few minutes whining to myself…what I really want to do is travel writing. But that can’t happen because…

But wait….why not?

So the idea for Booked was born. Because this is the Internet and I can write about anything I please, right?

Charlotte Was Both will still exist and I will still post there – about books, movies, faith. But I’m going to concentrate more of my energies into travel writing. Readers have enjoyed my travel-related posts in the past so maybe this is a season of just going with that for a while. I am thinking that I can spend a few years seeing things and telling people about those things in interesting and occasionally amusing ways – right?


[Read more]

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RedState: Huntsman "Plotted" Against President of U.S. (by Deciding to Run for President Himself) While Serving as Ambassador to China

Of all the reasons I've seen for not supporting Jon Huntsman for the GOP nomination for President (and I've read some compelling ones as well as some ludicrous ones), Erick Erickson of Red State provides the stupidest reason I've come across so far.

By this logic, Thomas Jefferson would be unfit to receive Erickson's vote for President. I mean, he decided to run for President against John Adams while serving as Adams' Vice-President (not to mention all his machinations while serving as Washington's Secretary of State). Although the position of VP has been unfavorably compared by one occupant of that office to "a bucket of warm spit/piss", it is (since one is next in line to the Presidency), arguably, a more important position than Ambassador to China.

I don't know, maybe Erickson does feel that way about the 3rd President, as well. Mr. Jefferson certainly has his detractors.


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Huntsman PAC Launched - Does This Mean Pro-Life Former Utah Gov is Running?

Is Jon Huntsman the 2012 GOP Dark Horse?

Why is Jon Huntsman Considered a "Moderate"?

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Wednesday, May 04, 2011

Huntsman PAC Launched - Does This Mean Pro-Life Former Utah Gov is Running?


LifeNews reports:
Former two-term Utah Governor Jon Huntsman, who recently stepped down from his position as ambassador to China to possibly launch a bid for the Republican nomination for president, has started a federal political action committee.

The move is seen as a precursor for a possible Republican bid for president in 2012 against pro-abortion President Barack Obama.

Huntsman, who is pro-life and supported and signed into law various pro-life bills, would be able to travel and raise money in the weeks ahead as he decides whether to take the next step in the process of becoming a candidate. Huntsman filed paperwork with the Federal Election Committee to begin “H PAC,” which would function eventually as the full-fledged campaign committee should he decided to move ahead further.

Huntsman spokesman Tim Miller told Politico the former governor will not use the “testing the waters” or exploratory committee that most other potential candidates have used to move step-by-step towards an official primary election campaign.

“This is a paperwork step,” Miller said. “He’s doing the organizational things required by campaign finance law. When he wants to make an announcement he will make an announcement.”

Miller indicated a decision on becoming an official candidate for the GOP nomination would come likely in early summer — in time for the all-important Ames, Iowa straw poll vote. Politico indicates Huntsman, freed form the legal constraints of serving as ambassador, has begun meeting with potential aides, donors and campaign workers as he prepares for the future...

[Read more]
My Comments:
This seems like good news. And now the bad news: Jimmy Carter has just given Hunstman the kiss of death.


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Is Jon Huntsman the 2012 GOP Dark Horse?

Why is Jon Huntsman Considered a "Moderate"?

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Tuesday, May 03, 2011

Michael Sean Winters and National Catholic Reporter Celebrate Bin Laden's Death

Of all the responses in the Catholic blogosphere to Osama bin Laden's death, few have matched the sort of jingoistic and nationalistic bravado that we've seen in the secular media and on the streets of New York City and Washington, D.C. The overwhelming majority of Catholic bloggers have been quite circumspect and reflective upon the killing of America's public enemy #1, soberly asking themselves what is the appropriate Christian response to the sudden, violent death of the mastermind of 9/11.

The most prominent exception to this general rule - the one high-profile Catholic blogger who openly relished (indeed, encouraged celebrating) bin Laden's demise - came from what might seem like a surprising source. The National Catholic Reporter, the newspaper of record for the Catholic left, routinely excoriates the Catholic blogosphere for what it sees as pro-Republican, militaristic, and jingoistic nationalism. And yet, it was the Reporter's most high-profile blogger, Michael Sean Winters, who used his blog, the so-called "Distinctly Catholic", to do a tap dance on the freshly killed body of bin Laden:
... I do not normally take delight in the death of a fellow human being. Nor do I support the death penalty. But, if there was one man on the planet whom it was important to kill, not to just let die, it was Osama bin Laden. You should not be able to murder well nigh to 3,000 Americans and others with impunity. If you commit such a crime, you should fear every moment of every day that U.S. Special Forces will come crashing through the door to bring you to justice. I am sure bin Laden knew better than to be captured alive. (Given the legal nightmare of Guantanamo, thank God he was killed on the spot!) It took a long time to track bin Laden down, too long, and it is impossible not to think that we might have reached this happy day earlier if we had not detoured through Baghdad. But, this is no time for recriminations. It is time to celebrate.

As I write these words, images of young people streaming into the streets in front of the White House chanting “USA” and singing the National Anthem are coming onto the television screen. If it were not so late and I did not have an early morning, I would drive down myself. Vengeance is not a healthy emotion, I know. Assassination is against the law, to be sure. But, better to indulge and go to confession. I am glad Osama bin Laden did not die in his bed, as I am glad Hitler did not die in his bed and as I am distressed hat Stalin and Mao did. Men who commit such evil do not deserve normal considerations of human sympathy or civilized respect. The world is well rid of bin Laden. It is a great day to be alive.
I think many Catholic bloggers, upon hearing the news, struggled with feeling happy over the news of bin Laden's death. But, in blogging about it at least, few gave such full-throated approval to the notion of celebrating the macabre as did Michael Sean Winters.

There is much that is disturbing about Winters' piece, but the part that troubled me most was his acknowledging that giving into vengeful thoughts is sinful, but nevertheless stating explicitly that he would go ahead and engage in (and, indeed, celebrate) such thoughts anyway, and then afterward take advantage of the sacrament of confession.

Think about that for a moment. Serious sin. Willfully engaged in. But it doesn't matter because he'll just go to confession later and seek forgiveness for a sin for which he doesn't appear to be the least bit sorry. Presumption. What's more, Winters is presuming upon the Divine Mercy and grace of God for his own sins, while in the very next breath declaring that another of God's children "do[es] not deserve normal considerations of human sympathy" (on Divine Mercy Sunday, no less, which is when Winters wrote this).

Now, earlier in this post, I noted that this piece came from "what might seem like a surprising source". It might seem suprising, that is, unless you know anything about the writing of one Michael Sean Winters. On any topic on which there is a disagreement between Catholics on on a matter of interest to the Church, just find out what the official Democrat Party position is, or which view is more advantageous to the Democrats were it to prevail, and that will pretty much tell you where Michael Sean Winters stands. (You've heard of "Republicath" bloggers who allegedly substitute the Republican platform for Catholic theology and label it as the latter? Well, Michael Sean Winters is the Democath blogger par excellence.) Here, the death of Osama bin Laden is being celebrated by the Obama Administration and the Democrats because it happened on their watch instead of George W. Bush's, so Winters happily joins in.

Suffice it to say, however, had this happened with Bush in the White House, and had the streets filled with people chanting "U.S.A" and other slogans and singing the National Anthem, and had some blogger on the right side of the Catholic blogosphere written a piece celebrating not only the death of bin Laden but the over-exuberant reaction thereto, I feel fairly confident in believing Michael Sean Winters would be singing a different tune. But, as fate would have it, this happened on his guy's watch, so bravado, jingoism, nationalism, and celebrating the death of the enemy is all the rage.

Ironically, it's the folks at The American Catholic, who Winters has at various times criticized as "yahoos" and as being "kookie" (I guess that's like being "kooky"), and who one prominent left-leaning blogger has described as being guilty of "blood lust" and pushing a "theology of violence", and who other left-leaning Catholics have parodied as "fascists", who had the definitive post on the appropriate Catholic reaction to bin Laden's death. Contrast Michael Sean Winters paean to veangence to another Michael's (Michael Denton) thoughtful and charitable post, "The Catholic Response to the Death of a Murderer".

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Monday, May 02, 2011

Digest of Today's Posts (2 May 2011)

  • Spring Photos - University of Virginia Pavilion Gardens, April 2011

  • The May Magnificat

  • Vatican Spokesman on Killing of Osama bin Laden
  • Labels:

    Spring Photos - University of Virginia Pavilion Gardens, April 2011






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    The May Magnificat


    The May Magnificat

    May is Mary's month, and I
    Muse at that and wonder why:
    Her feasts follow reason,
    Dated due to season --

    Candlemas, Lady Day;
    But the Lady Month, May,
    Why fasten that upon her,
    With a feasting in her honour

    Is it only its being brighter
    Than the most are must delight her?
    Is it opportunest
    And flowers finds soonest?

    Ask of her, the mighty mother;
    Her reply puts this other
    Question: What is Spring? --
    Growth in everything --

    Flesh and fleece, fur and feather
    Grass and green world all together;
    Star-eyed strawberry breasted
    Throstle above her nested

    Cluster of bugle blue eggs thin
    Forms and warms the life within;
    And bird and blossom swell
    In sod or sheath or shell.

    All things rising, all things sizing
    Mary sees, sympathising
    With that world of good
    Nature's motherhood.

    Their magnifying of each its kind
    With delight calls to mind
    How she did in her stored
    Magnify the Lord

    Well but there was more than this:
    Spring's universal bliss
    Much, had much to say
    To offering Mary May.

    When drop-of-blood-and-foam-dapple
    Bloom lights the orchard-apple
    And thicket and thorp are merry
    With silver-surféd cherry

    And azuring-over greybell makes
    Wood banks and brakes wash wet like lakes
    And magic cuckoo call
    Caps, clears, and clinches all --

    This ecstasy all through mothering earth
    Tells Mary her mirth till Christ's birth
    To remember and exultation
    In God who was her salvation.


    ~Gerard Manley Hopkins

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    Vatican Spokesman on Killing of Osama bin Laden

    From Catholic News Service:
    ... Osama bin Laden, as we all know, bore the most serious responsibility for spreading divisions and hatred among populations, causing the deaths of innumerable people, and manipulating religions for this purpose.

    In the face of a man’s death, a Christian never rejoices, but reflects on the serious responsibilities of each person before God and before men, and hopes and works so that every event may be the occasion for the further growth of peace and not of hatred.
    See also Michael Denton's well-written piece at The American Catholic, "The Catholic Response to the Death of a Murderer".

    My Comments
    Hopefully, the reaction to the news of bin Laden's death will become more reflective and the overexuberant reaction we've witnessed so far will be tempered. But at the same time, I'd like to see those who are condemning the jubilation (and I do not count the Vatican spokesman or Michael among them) show a bit more understanding and compassion for why people are reacting the way they are.

    Yes, more people should put into practice the Church’s teachings on mercy and forgiveness and embrace the Church’s teachings on social justice. I am convinced, however, that one reason more do not do so is because the pious “tsk-tsking” and “tut-tutting” of the more vocal proponents of social justice, which seems to never account for the natural feelings of those impacted by such crimes, is so offputting.


    UPDATE
    What I've written above is especially apt in discussing the overjubilant celebrations we've seen among college-age students. I ask the harshest critics to put themselves in their shoes for a moment. Cut 'em some slack. They have grown up with bin Laden being the greatest menace the world faced (aside from George W. Bush). They've grown up with terror alerts, pat-down frisks in airports, and the horror of being children and watching the ultimate in man's inhumanity to man as those buildings came crashing down, turning living, breathing humanity into mere dust particles.

    Think back to how we felt when the menace of our childhood ended as the Berlin Wall came tumbling down, and imagine how these young people feel. It's a catharsis for them to be able to experience SOME emotion over this monster other than the fear, grief, anger, and disappointment they've experienced for the last 10 years.

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