Category Archives: Religion
The Dogma Within
Amy Coney Barrett is a Notre Dame Law professor. She was nominated by President Trump for a seat on the seventh court of appeals.
But first she has to get past Senate Judiciary Committee member Diane Feinstein. The Senator wanted answers about an article Professor Coney Barrett co-authored 20 years ago. It was a meditation on what a Catholic judge might do in a capital punishment case. The authors concluded he/she should recuse.
But the professor came across as a little too Catholic for the senator. Feinstein told her, “I think in your case, professor, when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you, and that’s of concern.”
Of course, the professor might have taken that as a compliment.
Man Bites Dogma
But no dogma lives within Senator Durbin. The apparently unorthodox Catholic senator from Illinois demanded to know if Coney Barrett is an “Orthodox” Catholic.
A WSJ opinion piece by theology professor C.C. Pecknold had this to say about the dogma:
Mr. Durbin’s attempt to make such a distinction shows that this affair is about more than Catholicism. It is about an ideology—a politically progressive civil religion—that makes comprehensive claims to which all other religions are expected to conform.
Trump Learns True Meaning of HIs Travel Ban
A Hawaiian judge helped President Trump find the true meaning of his travel ban. Trump thought he was was using his legal authority as president to keep out perceived threats to the United States.
The president’s authority to declare such suspensions can been found in section 212(f) of the INA, the pertinent part of which reads as follows:
“(f) Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.”
In this case he said he needed time to vet refugees from jihad torn countries to make sure they aren’t jihadists.
U.S. District Court Judge Derrick Watson – a Harvard classmate appointed by President Obama – says otherwise. The judge ruled Trump’s real intent was to keep out Muslims. The judge knows this because Trump said so in campaign speeches.
Finally, a Democrat who doesn’t think Trump lies.
Al Smith Dinner
Cardinal Dolan had a “box seat” between Hillary and Trump at the annual Al Smith Dinner in New York. He said he was “moved by their interaction together”.
I had to wonder if he didn’t just want to move.
Al Smith V said the room got “a little uncomfortable” when The Donald said Hillary pretended “not to hate Catholics.”
Here are video highlights of their speeches.
Try not to notice Maria Bartiromo or the sweaty guy next to the podium.
Tim Kaine Personally Opposed
Tim Kaine says he’s personally pro-life but supports the constitution which, he says, supports abortion. In fact, in order to become Hillary’s running-mate, Kaine had to take a vow of silence about late-term partial birth abortion.
Kevin Williamson in NR Online thinks Kaine is pro-stupid. And he has an interesting take on personal beliefs:
I very much doubt that I am the only person in the world who is Catholic in part because he is pro-life, and not the other way around. My religious views have changed over time, but my opposition to abortion never has. One of the things that drew me to the Catholic Church years ago was the mystery of how that particular corporation, practically alone among the important institutions of the world, fully appreciated the inhumane violence of abortion, understood the ways in which that violence echoes far outside of the local Planned Parenthood abattoir, and placed that knowledge at the center of its public affairs.
Intellectually, Tim Kaine’s argument about abortion is incoherent and indefensible; it is, in fact, illiterate. He argues that while his own Catholic devotion points him in a pro-life direction, the fact that we are a pluralistic society with a constitutional guarantee of religious freedom precludes him from supporting initiatives that would enshrine certain Catholic preferences in law. That did not stop him from campaigning against capital punishment and from using his gubernatorial powers to that end (the Catholic position on the death penalty is not absolute and, given the history of the church, hardly could be; its prohibition of abortion is absolute) any more than the First Amendment has stopped any cookie-cutter progressive with an Italian or Irish surname from citing the example of Jesus when arguing for this or that social-welfare program. (Never mind, for the moment, that this misconstrues that example.) Back in the ancient days when he was running for president, Barack Obama cited his faith in explaining his opposition to homosexual marriage. But it is not the hypocrisy that rankles so much as the stupidity: There are millions, perhaps billions, of people on this planet who oppose abortion who are not Catholics, who are not bound by Catholic practice, who are not informed by Catholic teaching. There are pro-life Jews, Protestants, Mormons, Muslims (though those who denounce the so-called Religious Right as the “Christian Taliban” would do well to appreciate how liberal sharia actually is on the question of abortion), Hindus, pagans, agnostics, atheists, chiropractors, witch-doctors, and people who believe in horoscopes. My friend and colleague Charles C. W. Cooke is a pro-life non-believer.
Priest Beheaded by Islamic Radicals
Two Islamic radicals entered the church of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray near Rouen, Normandy and beheaded 85 year old Father Jacques Hamel as he said Mass.
Beheaded
According to Breitbart the church was on an Islamic hit list. And it sits next door to the Yahiya mosque of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray. Breitbart says it’s the home mosque of “the notorious French jihadist executioner Maxime Hauchard.”
Yahiya mosque is not on a Christian hit list.
