Yet Another Politically “Bright” Idea

Written by Gary Isbell

December 22, 2011

As we near the end of 2011, the controversy over the banning of incandescent light bulbs blazes on. The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 brought together the government, fanatical environmentalists and big-business lobbyists to pass a law that will gradually outlaw the majority of household incandescent bulbs. Now, it appears that the ban has been postponed until next year. The reprieve was won not because bulb opponents have seen the light. Rather, Senate Democrats sacrificed the ban as part of a deal to pass a spending bill at literally the eleventh hour when it was introduced before midnight on December 14. Neatly buried in a massive 1,200-page $1 trillion omnibus-spending package, the provision does not overturn the ban but prevents the government from spending any money to enforce it. This is a temporary stay of execution for the 100-watt bulb, but only until next year. With this in mind, we cannot expect any new incandescent light bulb factories to open in the near future. General Electric just closed their last one in Virginia in September 2010. Without Congress blocking enforcement for funding again next year, we may well see the end of Thomas Edison’s invention once and for all. As with any poorly made plan, this too has resulted in problems such as massive layoffs in Ohio, Virginia and Kentucky in the light bulb manufacturing industry and obliges Americans to purchase more expensive bulbs with a long return on their investment. On top of this, the majority of these bulbs are made in China. Even the principal argument in favor of outlawing incandescent light bulbs — the environmental one — does not hold water. It seems that no one is talking much about toxins released when disposing of these new bulbs. Nor are they mentioning the fact that some big-business interests favor the new bulbs because they are a high profit margin item as opposed to low profit for the old bulbs. This results in additional revenues for stockholders, but not for all stakeholders such as factory workers. It becomes painfully evident that the incessant mantra about saving the environment and our natural resources is merely empty rhetoric behind which is an ideological agenda. If our government only examined the facts available to the public, our legislators would see that this great debate over the lowly light bulb makes no sense at all. In fact, the whole idea, for lack of better words, is a dim one.

Defense Department to Allow Muslim cadets to Wear Hijabs

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) announced today that the Department of Defense will begin allowing Muslim and Sikh students who wear an Islamic head scarf (hijab) or a turban to participate in the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC).

“We welcome the fact that Muslim and Sikh students nationwide will now be able to participate fully in JROTC leadership activities while maintaining their religious beliefs and practices,” said CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad.

In October, the Washington-based Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization wrote to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta after a 14-year-old Muslim student at Ravenwood High School in Brentwood, Tenn., was forced to transfer out of a JROTC class when her commanding officers told her she could not wear hijab while marching in the September homecoming parade.

Christmas Fights Back

Written by Gary Isbell

We hear about the famous War on Christmas that our secular society wages with great intensity. However, the latest news from the front is not encouraging for those who would worship around a holiday tree. According to a recent Rasmussen report, 88% of Americans will celebrate Christmas this year and 81% of that group will celebrate it as a religious holiday. From these statistics, we can clearly deduce that Christianity and Christmas have yet to disappear as of 2011. The ferocious onslaught of secular humanism rages as it pushes its agenda through the media, the political world and our schools. However, the effects of the birth of one solitary Infant 2011 years ago — the Infant Jesus — cannot be extinguished. On that marvelous day filled with grandeur and joy intertwined with the sufferings that Our Lady and Saint Joseph endured having been rejected throughout Bethlehem, Our Lord came to fulfill the prophecies of the Old Testament and bring redemption and salvation. He came to establish His Church, which would come to be the most efficient, salvific and maternal institution ever known to man through which multitudes of souls would be saved. She is the holy deposit of everything that is good, true and beautiful, and all of this started with the first step of an Infant that was discreet, humble and hidden along His path of suffering, struggle and triumph. This tiny Infant confronts a world that boasts of tolerance, coexistence, freedom of speech and religion but simultaneously declares war on Christmas and Christians alike. Despite this world’s banning of Christmas scenes in the public square, the proclaiming of “holiday trees” and use of the sterile greetings such as “Happy Holidays,” the spirit of Christmas cannot so easily be suppressed. The sublime example of a God who became Flesh and dwelt amongst us powerfully fights back. Despite everything, Christmas is still impregnated with the notion of the birth of Our Savior, where in that holy and silent night, we still sense the sweetness and perfections that emanated from the Divine Infant in the manger in Bethlehem. The irresistible power and majesty of this great event in history cannot help but cause awe and veneration for the glory of God and peace on earth, even for those men with tattered remnants of “good will.” We can see this in a performance of Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus by the Opera Company of Philadelphia at Macy's in Philadelphia in 2010. This surprise performance not only delighted everyone there, but it was recorded and received nearly 8 million views on YouTube with almost 5 thousand comments. With such reactions, we cannot conclude that secular humanism has conquered the heart and soul of Western man. See the video by clicking here However, we cannot think that the fight is over. We must still fight back to restore Christmas and Christian civilization. Thus, we kneel before the manger of the Infant Jesus and give thanks for His coming and petition Him that He give us the grace to resist those who strive to take Christ from Christmas. We should continuously petition Saint Joseph, Our Lady and the Christ Child for their help while being ever mindful of Our Lady’s words at Fatima: “Finally, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” We at the American TFP, pray that you are blessed with all the graces of the serenity of the first Christmas and an indomitable spirit to fight heroically for Our Lady and Her Divine Son.

Homosexual Practice and Religious Persecution

Written by Luiz Sérgio Solimeo

Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke stated that it is “critical at this time that Christians stand up for the natural moral law,” especially in defense of life and the family, in an interview with CNA/EWTN News on November 28, 2011.¹

The Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura warned about the possibility of religious persecution in the United States. Asked if he could envision U.S. Catholics even being arrested for preaching their faith, he replied: “I can see it happening, yes.” According to the high-ranking prelate, the Church could be accused of “engaging in illegal activity, for instance, in its teaching on human sexuality.”

However, the combative cardinal does not want Catholics to do nothing in face of this. He emphasizes that Christians must “stand strong, give a strong witness and insist on what is right and good for us both as individuals and society.”

Is Religion Opposed to “Human Rights”?
That persecution has already manifested itself in many ways, for example, by obliging several dioceses to give up child adoption services because they are unable to agree with adoption by same-sex couples — a betrayal of Catholic principles on the immorality of homosexual practice.

The Secretary of State has now given a specific doctrinal reason to justify religious persecution by claiming that the Church is an obstacle to the implementation of human rights! Indeed, if “human rights” are identified with the “rights of homosexuals,” by condemning homosexual practice the Church would be setting up obstacles to respecting “human rights.”

These concepts are found in the Remarks in Recognition of International Human Rights Day, presented by the Secretary of State to the United Nations’ Human Rights Commission in Geneva on December 6, 2011.² The document affirms that “gay rights and human rights... are one and the same.”

For the Secretary of State, “obstacles standing in the way of protecting the human rights of LGBT people rest on deeply held personal, political, cultural, and religious beliefs.” The Remarks argue that alleging religious principles to reject the “rights” of homosexuals “is not unlike the justification offered for violent practices towards women like honor killings, widow burning, or female genital mutilation.” Thus, the Remarks say, “slavery… was once justified as sanctioned by God [all emphasis ours].”

The Secretary of State continues: “[N]o practice or tradition trumps the human rights that belong to all of us. And this holds true for inflicting violence on LGBT people, criminalizing their status or behavior, expelling them from their families and communities, or tacitly or explicitly accepting their killing.”

Therefore, religion is supposedly a factor of persecution and violence. Furthermore, when religion is seen as opposed to “human rights,” it begins to be looked at as inhuman and thus unnatural. Thus, the struggle on behalf of human rights presumably requires combating religion – any religion – regardless of is doctrines and practices.

A Religion Closed Up in Church
The Remarks by the Secretary of State distinguish between religious belief and practice: while there is freedom to believe in religious precepts, putting them into practice requires conformity with the new “human rights” theory, that is, the person must resign himself to accepting the legitimacy of homosexual behavior.

Indeed, the Remarks read,

“Universal human rights include freedom of expression and freedom of belief, even if our words or beliefs denigrate the humanity of others. Yet, while we are each free to believe whatever we choose, we cannot do whatever we choose, not in a world where we protect the human rights of all.”

Religion is thus reduced to mere interior beliefs without consequences in real life.

Now then, to the Catholic religion in particular, this distinction is an absurdity. The reason is that morals – that is, the set of principles that regulate human behavior before God and neighbor – are not dissociable from dogma. Indeed, it is in his practical life that man bears testimony to his faith and leads his life according to the Law of God. On the other hand, revealed morals is an explicitation of natural law, accessible to man through the light of reason, which also originates in God, the Creator of all things.

As a consequence, not only moral theology would no longer make any sense but also the moral philosophy and ethics found in every manual of philosophy beginning with the Greek and Roman pagans.

Can Homosexual Behavior Be Equated with Race?
At the same time, the Remarks liken LGBT people to “races” and “religious minorities.”

“Like being a woman, like being a racial, religious, tribal, or ethnic minority, being LGBT does not make you less human. And that is why gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights.”

“Costs are incurred whenever any group is treated as lesser or the other, whether they are women, racial, or religious minorities, or the LGBT.”

However, a behavior such as the practice of homosexuality cannot be equated with a physical type or a cultural standard. While ethnic characteristics are inherited with the genetic patrimony and cultural features passed on with upbringing, individual behavior depends on the person’s free will. There is no such thing as a scientific proof of the existence of a homosexual gene that would lead people compulsively to act in a homosexual fashion. Nor is the anatomy or physiology of homosexuals different from those of other human beings.

The same God Who revealed truths on what we must believe also revealed truths on how we are to live. Footnotes 1. David Kerr, “Cardinal Burke reflects on his first year in the Sacred College,” http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/cardinal-burke-reflects-on-his-first-year-in-the-sacred-college/. [back] 2. Hillary Rodham Clinton, “Remarks in Recognition of International Human Rights Day,” Dec. 6, 2011, http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2011/12/178368.htm. [back] 3. 1 John 2:16. [back] 4. Cf. Romans 8:21. [back]

The Liberty of the Children of God
We Catholics belong to a militant Church. Militant, because She is in this world and must face the “world” in the spiritual sense of the word, that is, “the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world.”³

By heeding Cardinal Burke’s appeal, we will bear a “strong witness” to our faith according to the laws of God and to the just laws of men in order to ensure the true liberty of the children of God.⁴

---

Scenes from the TFP Christmas Open House

Nearly 300 attended the annual TFP Christmas Open House held at the national headquarters of the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP) in Spring Grove, Pennsylvania on December 18. Here are a few scenes from the event.