I’m a sucker for personality profiles, political quizzes, and other similar tests
floating around the Net. I just took a cool test called The
Ethical Philosophy Selector (Thanks to The
Nomad Tavern). It ranks your similarity to famous philosophers and schools of
thought. In that respect, it’s a lot like BeliefNet’s Belief-O-Matic.
Churches Go Commercial To Spread Their Message
TV Campaigns Bring Denominations to Homes
By Alan Cooperman, Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 11, 2004; Page A01
"What burst into the Cleveland marketing executive's head that night in January 2002, however, was not a message from the Almighty. It was a slogan for a television advertising campaign. Beginning this fall, the United Church of Christ plans to spend $30 million to promote itself using the line that came to Buford in his sleep — 'God is still speaking' — to reflect its willingness to reinterpret the Bible and embrace such innovations as same-sex marriage and openly gay ministers."
I just love this:
The Episcopal Church, for example, has faced an insurrection by conservative parishes since its ordination of a gay bishop in New Hampshire last year. But marketers see an opportunity.
"Among 20- to 30-year-olds, everybody's heard of the gay bishop. And in focus groups, the words that keep coming up are that we are a 'progressive,' 'open' and 'nonjudgmental' church," said Daniel B. England, the church's director of communication.
Progress requires a goal to be meaningful. An open mind is like an open trap – it's only useful when it closes on something. Nonjudgemental, in this context, really means unwilling to discriminate between right and wrong.
I’m really starting to like Chaput. Thanks, edey, for the tip. 🙂
What
we can do isn’t always what we should do
Embryonic stem cell research: The end never justifies the means
A few years ago, a friend of mine attended a conference in Washington, D.C., titled “Supercomputing and the Human Endeavor.” Chemists, biologists, physicists, computer experts, educators, business executives, political leaders, social scientists and a few religious scholars took part. The idea behind the meeting was simple. At the national research level, computers have now become so fast and so powerful that they can begin to simulate primitive biological life. Soon, they may almost appear to “think.” And that leads to questions about the meaning of artificial intelligence; the nature of consciousness; and what — if anything -— makes the human person unique. My friend came back pretty shaken up. The theme had been important. The attendees had been brilliant. But while a lot of enthusiasm had surrounded the practical uses of supercomputers, nobody really wanted to dig too deeply into the “human endeavor.” Why? Because nobody could really agree on the essence of what the word “human” means. Nor did anyone want to suggest what the purpose of the human endeavor might be.
Thinning
the ranks in a town called Death Row
Death penalty a sign of nation’s divided heart about sanctity of human life
Across the country, 38 states including our own have the death penalty. That works out to about 3,400 men and women awaiting execution — enough to populate a Colorado town the size of Yuma. Last week the U.S. Supreme Court closed off the appeals of more than 100 of those condemned persons.
The aforementioned comments discussion at GetReligion is becoming a battle between those for and against women priests, or at least allowing them as a solution to the priest scandal. *rolls eyes*
I'm with this guy:
Perhaps I'm obtuse, but I'm having trouble seeing a connection between priests who participate in deviant sexual practices and the need for women priests. The latter is unproven as a corrective and lumping the two together under the increasingly meaningless rubric of "justice" does violence to common sense and church tradition….Wooderson
PRIESTESSES IN THE CHURCH?
by C. S. Lewis
"I SHOULD LIKE BALLS INFINITELY BETTER', SAID CAROLINE Bingley, 'if they were carried on in a different manner . . It would surely be much more rational if conversation instead of dancing made the order of the day.' 'Much more rational, I dare say,' replied her brother, 'but it would not be near so much like a Ball.' (1) We are told that the lady was silenced: yet it could be maintained that Jane Austen has not allowed Bingley to put forward the full strength of his position. He ought to have replied with a distinguo. In one sense conversation is more rational for conversation may exercise the reason alone, dancing does not. But there is nothing irrational in exercising other powers than our reason. On certain occasions and for certain purposes the real irrationality is with those who will not do so. The man who would try to break a horse or write a poem or beget a child by pure syllogizing would be an irrational man; though at the same time syllogizing is in itself a more rational activity than the activities demanded by these achievements. It is rational not to reason, or not to limit oneself to reason, in the wrong place; and the more rational a man is the better he knows this."
"These remarks are not intended as a contribution to the criticism of Pride and Prejudice. They came into my head when I heard that the Church of England (2) was being advised to declare women capable of Priests' Orders…"
Women, Ordination, and Angels
Michael Novak
"When Dr. George Carey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, visited Pope John Paul II in May 1992, the two church leaders discussed the probable future ordination of women priests in the Anglican Church. That, the Pope said, 'touched on the very nature of the sacrament of holy orders.' A Vatican spokesman said later that 'the Catholic Church, for fundamental theological reasons, does not believe it has the right to authorize such ordination.'
Catholicity or female priests? Must the choice be made?
Al Kimel
"Is it possible to oppose the pansexual morality of the Episcopal Church and still support the decision of the Episcopal Church to ordain women to the presbyterate and episcopate? Clearly most of those who have committed themselves to the Network and American Anglican Council believe that it is possible. But this has become now a real question for me."
You say potahto. Either way, it’s spin. I take back the nice things I said about the Bishops’ response to Communiongate. Like so many Church documents, it has too much wiggle room to have any real force or meaning (for any side).
In a further indication that the leadership of the Church is endeavouring to take the heat out of communion being used as a political battering ram, the respected CNS news agency is reporting that the American Bishops are trying "to move abortion politics away from the Communion rail and into the hearts of individual Catholics".