Seemingly based on the Libertarian Party's political quiz, this Moral Politics quiz plots your position on a map whose axes are moral order (x) and moral rules (y). Like any such quiz, it oversimplifies matters, but it's entertaining none the less. I like that I score as the party-less centrist I am. (HT:I Am a Christian Too) Continue reading
I think we all gotta watch out for the addiction that blogging
can be. The people who pay the biggest price for our extra hour or two a day of
blogging are our families. If other people keep reading while we step aside awhile
I think that is great. – from 21st Century Reformation’s Warnie acceptance speech
Amen. I need to spend less time blogging and more time with my wife. I’m working on ways I can reduce the time I spend each day blogging. I’m probably going to take a “weekly wrap-up” approach to frivolous stuff and news that isn’t “breaking”. I’m also going to try to focus on just one or two essay-length posts each day.
Some people appear on the blogging scene and, like Athena popping out of Zeus’ head fully formed and armed, seem to have their style and goals thoroughly worked out and sharpened. Others, such as myself, develop their styles and reevaluate their goals slowly. Take a trip through my archives (you’ll find the link in the side bar) and you’ll see that this blog has changed a lot from what it started out as. I’m still refining it and probably will continue to do so for as long as I keep it going.
Anyhow, please bear with me as I rearrange my priorities. Hopefully, by Lent I’ll be in a groove.
Bonus article:
For Some, The Blogging Never Stops
By KATIE HAFNER; TIM GNATEK CONTRIBUTED REPORTING FOR THIS ARTICLE.
TO celebrate four years of marriage, Richard Wiggins and his wife, Judy Matthews, recently spent a week in Key West, Fla. Early on the morning of their anniversary, Ms. Matthews heard her husband get up and go into the bathroom. He stayed there for a long time. ‘”I didn’t hear any water running, so I wondered what was going on”,’ Ms. Matthews said. When she knocked on the door, she found him seated with his laptop balanced on his knees, typing into his Web log, a collection of observations about the technical world, over a wireless link.
…as well as 2000 years of Church teaching. According to AP, "the spokesman for the Catholic Church in Spain has said it supports the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS." Well, doesn't this makes things interesting?
Church officials in Spain are attempting damage control by telling the press, "Contrary to what some have said, it is not true that the Church has changed its position on condoms." I doubt such back-peddling will make this issue go away.
I'm quite curious to see what Rome does about this little rebellion. Some will argue that a bishop has the authority to instruct the members of his diocese however he pleases, so long as he doesn't go against dogma or infallible pronouncements. This is true. Technically, the injunction against artificial contraception was not declared infallibly. However, three popes have declared such an injunction and as St. Augustine said, "Rome has spoken; the case is closed". Papal encyclicals are authoritative and the instructions therein can only be rescinded by a pope. Others will claim that while the Church speaks authoritatively against using condoms as contraceptions, She has not condemned their use to prevent the spread of AIDS and other diseases. This is flawed reasoning. Sex is intended for reproduction within marriage. Sex outside marriage is unaceptable. If people do not have sex with multiple partners, disease cannot spread. What then of babies born to infected parents? Those infected should refrain from all sexual activity and become "eunuchs for the kingdom". If the infected cease sexual activity and everyone ceases extra-marital sexual activity, the disease will not spread further. Using condoms is like covering a bleeding artery with a band-aid.
A CONSUMER’S GUIDE TO A BRAVE NEW WORLD
By Wesley J. Smith
"Will the cost of biotechnology’s alleviation of human suffering be our acceptance of a ‘Brave New World,’ where scientists wield godlike power to refashion our biological nature’ If so, we will not get there in one giant leap. Rather, we will descend into the darkness in small steps, all but unaware that the shadows are lengthening."
Welcome to Our Brave New World: An Interview with Wesley J. Smith
By John Zmirak
"Wesley Smith has exposed corporate corruption with Ralph Nader, and warned against the eugenic implications of the ‘right to die’ movement. In his new book, ‘A Consumer’s Guide to a Brave New World,’ he tells how the Biotech industry’s push for stem cell research and human cloning threatens the rights of the poor, the sick, and the unborn."
“Are the new frontiers of neuroscience and artificial intelligence
doing away with notions of the soul?”“Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the Pope’s
vicar for Rome and president of the Italian episcopal conference, responded to the
question in an interview with the ‘2004 Philosophy Yearbook,’ published
by Mondadori. Here are some of the cardinal’s answers. ”
