Coffee Bowl Browsing (Conspiracy Theory Edition)

As I have noted before, I'm a fan of conspiracy theories. (CT)  Why, you ask?  Conspiracy theories satisfy a basic human need to make sense of information in an orderly fashion.  It is a well-accepted notion that humans never experience the world in its raw form.  We always interpret what we experience.  Think about trying to recall every detail of sense data you receive in a day.  We filter.  We collate.  We store for recall.  The information we remember is highly selective for the simple reason that we would explode if we had to remember every single detail of a day in order to function.  Not only is our memory selective but our actual perception is selective as well.  Physically, we are limited in what we can experience, e.g. four dimensional space-time, a small section of the light spectrum, limited aural range, etc.  Our senses are easily enhanced with instrumentation (microscopes, telescopes, etc.).  But even these are limited to enhancing our five senses.  Throw in the collating and heuristic power of mathematics and you have a potent means for connecting a lot of cosmic dots.  Conspiracy theories seem to be one of the ways some of us filter, arrange, and understand vast tracts of information.  With the rise and wide availability of the internet, CT's have become the daily bread of on-line paranoids worldwide.

Besides, they're fun.

By far my favorite CT:  We are secretly ruled by a reptilian race. 

Videos proving that many of our global leaders are actually evolved reptiles.

Here's another fav:  the Mayan-Masonic connection using numerology.

The grandaddy of all CT's:  The Protocols of the Elders of Zion

Jesus survived his execution:  Priory of Zion (made famous again by hack, Dan Brown)

Global governance by the elite:  New World Order

Anti-Catholic CT's abound

AIDS/HIV CT's:  made famous in 2008 by B.O.'s pastor, Jeremiah Wright

Can't forget the hundreds of CT's about the JFK assassination

The Evil Jesuits and their plots to control the world (this is true, btw. . hehehe)

The Jesuits killed Pope John Paul I. . . I have irrefutable proof but the Jebbies kidnapped me and put a chip in my head that prevents me from revealing the truth!

During the recent celebration of the Apollo moon landing it was revealed that the original pics of the landing were destroyed.  All we have left are pics of pics.  Suspicious much?

Reptilian agents, working with George Bush, Bono, and the Queen of England used advanced alien technology to bring down the World Trade Center on 9/11 in order to start the war in Iraq in a run-up to a global coup by the New World Order Committee of 300.  No, seriously.

Aight, that should be enough to keep you busy this weekend.  Remember the essential tools for filtering the information provided by CT:

Occam's razor:  does the alternative story explain more of the evidence than the mainstream story, or is it just a more complicated and therefore less useful explanation of the same evidence?

Logic: do the proofs offered follow the rules of logic, or do they employ fallacies of logic?

Methodology: are the proofs offered for the argument well constructed, i.e., using sound methodology? Is there any clear standard to determine what evidence would prove or disprove the theory?

Whistleblowers: how many people – and what kind – have to be loyal conspirators?

Falsifiability: is it possible to demonstrate that specific claims of the theory are false, or are they "unfalsifiable"?

Of course, we all KNOW that CT debunkers are actually working for the reptiles as a way of keeping their existence secret.  Sheesh.  Do they think we are stupid?

Prison Dress Code for Mass?

Diogenes, always good for a snarky observation, offers this insight/question:

The U.S. Bureau of Prisons applies the following restrictions to persons visiting inmates incarcerated in federal detention facilities:

"Inappropriate/unauthorized attire is considered to be: transparent clothing; strapless garments; any garment which exposes the stomach or any intimate area of the body, tank-tops; halter tops; dresses, skirts and shorts which are shorter than four (4) inches from the middle of the knee; garments with obscene logos; low-cut blouses; obvious lack of undergarments."

So ask yourself: did the persons who presented themselves to receive the Eucharist at your parish last Sunday meet the prison decency code?

Ouch.

Coffee Bowl Browsing (Ecumenical Edition)

A few Zen stories to boggle the mind (I mean, boggle the No-Mindedness)

A Catholic guide for praying in the workplace

Bible research tools

A Christian think-tank with lots of links

Huge database on Christian topics of interests

Christian cartoons

Multilingual Bible translations in MP3 format (audio)

Everything you ever wanted to know about the catacombs of Rome

Lots and lots of free Christian images for download

More Christian clipart

Persecution of the Church worldwide

Have we gotten Jesus wrong?  (article)

Free interlinear Greek/Hebrew Bible software and a site for Biblical Greek

Christian penpals

The Official Peter Kreeft website (Dr. Kreeft is a Catholic philosopher): fixed

What do our Protestant brothers and sisters hear from the pulpit?

The story of the Shroud of Turin

Invitation to Prayer (Anglican)

The Real Presence of the Lord in the Eucharist

Reading the Word of God with the Church

Books for the Angelicum library (Sold Out 2!)

And the other two are sold and shipped!  All I can say is: Wow. . .thanks. . .and God bless! 

WOW!  My thanks to the generous soul who purchased seven of the nine books for the library!  Let me know if you need a letter for tax purposes. . .(leave a comment, I won't publish it. . .)

As regular readers of HancAquam know all too well, I am not shy about begging for books for my philosophy library.

What I want to do now is beg for some books for the university library!

Why the Angelicum library?  Our library here has a very good collection of books in medieval and early modern philosophy and theology.  (Remember:  this is the university of the great Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P.and Pope John Paul II.)  Our holdings in contemporary philosophy are not so good.  Like most of the ministries in the Order, we are woefully underfunded and understaffed.  It's a rule in the Order that if a man is good with money, he's automatically excluded from consideration as a friar and sent to the Jebbies!  More than one friar has suggested that we turn our financial dealings over to our Jesuit brothers (ahem).  I think there have been serious moral objections made to this possibility. . .

Anyway, the university's student body is mostly composed of religious men and women from Central and South America, Asia, and Africa.  This means that their ability to purchase books for themselves is severely limited.  Profs, more often than not, resort to lots of handouts, or distribute class materials via the internet.  Because of the shortage of books, students are not allowed to check them out of the library. 

Since Angelicum students often go back to their communities tobecome superiors and/or bishops, the Ang is training the future leadership of the Church in those areas where the Church is growing the fastest. 

Here's how you can help train that future leadership. . .

If you click over to the WISH LIST you will find that the first nine books listed are philosophy anthologies. These books will give philosophy students here at the university much needed resources for research.

So, send me the books and I will give them to Fr. Miguel Itza, OP (our librarian) for inclusion in the university's holdings.  We can probably arrange a donation letter for tax purposes if you want one.

Don't be shy! Check 'em out. . .

Traveling Friar

I rec'd an odd request via email yesterday. . .

"Father Powell, where have you been in the world?  What countries?"

OK. . .

USA (obviously)
UK (incl. Gibraltar)
France
Germany
Italy (duh)
Portugal
Spain
Japan
China
Mexico
Peru
Greece

I've flown over Canada and Switzerland. 

Still on my list to visit:  Russia, Brazil, Thailand, Australia, India, and Egypt.  Frankly, I'd like to visit just about anywhere!

Coffee Bowl Browsing

Heh. . . a bishop with a spine. . .who knew?

My Ph.L. thesis subject:  Rev'd Dr. John Polkinghorne, "God and Cosmology" (vids)

NJ politics, beer guts, and a governor too fat for the job?

Rocco reports that doctrinal talks are due to begin today btw the Vatican and SSPX. . .the new rector of the Angelicum and Dominican friar, Fr. Charles Morerod is part of the Vatican team.  Pray for the success of this effort.

Trailer for the new movie about the Fatima apparitions:  The 13th Day

SanFran tax assessor uses office to retaliate against RC archdiocese

Charles Krauthammer, "Decline is a Choice":  "The corollary to unchosen European collapse was unchosen American ascendancy. We--whom Lincoln once called God's "almost chosen people"--did not save Europe twice in order to emerge from the ashes as the world's co-hegemon. We went in to defend ourselves and save civilization. . ."

"What might Creation, the Spirit of Gaia, our Living Dew-Hearted Mother Earth spinning in the Infinite Cosmic Mystery, be asking of the church today?"  I think she's asking the Church why we allow morons who write junk like this to remain in Church leadership.

Good news in the fight against AIDS/HIV in Africa

Deconstructing five common pro-abortion dodges

And by the same author, "The New Catholic Manliness"

I want one of these! 

Oh $#!t moments. . .

What every Japanese redneck wants:  roadkill toys!

Finding toilets in Rome. . .or wherever you are!

Why does your pastor avoid the culture wars?

Doug Giles of Big Hollywood gives us "10 Reasons Why Pastors Avoid the Culture Wars."  He concludes, correctly:

If the ministers within the good old US of A would crucify their fear of man, get solidly briefed regarding the chief political issues, not sweat necessary division, not get caught up in last days madness, maintain their hope for tomorrow, understand their liberties under God and our Constitution, not become so heavenly minded that they’re no earthly good, focus on the majors and blow off bowing to cash instead of convictions, then maybe . . . just maybe . . . we will see their righteous influence cause our nation to take the needed sharp turn away from the secularist progressives’ speedily approaching putrid pit.

Amen.  Give that man a pulpit!

OP's Out in Force, Baby!!!

Catholic Nerds from the Angelicum attend Sunday's Canonization

(L-R) Frs. Bernard (Malta), Yuri (Belarus), and Benedict (USA)

Vain reasoning, Darkened minds

28th Week OT (T): Readings

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

La Chiesa dei Santi Domenico e Sisto, Roma

We can blame Immanuel Kant. To save religious faith from the irreverent and potentially devastating demands of reason, Kant proposed that we remove faith from the preview of logic and science and seat it on a throne too high for the grubby instruments of empirical probing to reach. From this lofty perch, religious faith could rule the private world of each but never speak publicly to all. Kant gave us a way to be both rational in the modern sense and faithful in the traditional sense, both secular and religious without contradiction. Or so it seemed. Out of Kant's attempt to save faith from reason was born the human vanity of reasoning without God.* What happens to the human mind when we exchange “the glory of the immortal God for the likeness of an image of mortal man”? What happens to our reason when we turn our minds from God?

Writing to the Romans, Paul notes that there are those who “suppress the truth by their wickedness.” These are women and men who know the truth as it has been revealed to them yet “for although they knew God they did not accord him glory as God or give him thanks. Instead, they became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless minds were darkened.” It is one thing to be ignorant—simply not-knowing; it is an entirely different sort of thing to know the truth and reject it. These darkened minds “exchange the truth of God for a lie and revere and worship the creature rather than the creator.” For this sin, Paul writes, God “hands them over to impurity. . .” Nothing pure may be drawn from impurity; nothing whole and healthy can be found in brokenness and disease. When we remove the glory of God from the center of our lives—from our thinking, our feeling, our acting—and begin to think and feel and act apart from the truth that we know to be revealed in Christ Jesus, we begin a short journey to idolatry and the impurity of heart and mind that awaits those who know God and yet refuse to “accord him glory as God or give him thanks.”

One way to refuse to give God thanks is to pretend that His glory stops shining in our minds once we are in the public square. Kant gave modern man a way to be an “inside believer” and an “outside thinker,” that is, he imagined himself to be providing us with a way to be faithful without becoming irrational, a way of being rational without losing faith. What we have ended up with in Europe, Canada, and the U.S. is a social world divided between the Private Inside (where faith may rule) and the Public Outside (where reason without God is the only rule). Sadly, Catholics in these countries have, by and large, adopted this social logic and live by it without much complaint. It is certainly the easiest path for the spiritually lethargic. It is the path most likely to win its followers praise from their social “Betters.” And it is the path that will be most quickly lead to material advancement in a culture that prizes compromise over principle. But is this the way of Christ? Is the darkening of our reason at the altar of secular supremacy inevitable?

What does Christ say to the Pharisee who accuses him of uncleanliness? “Oh you Pharisees! Although you cleanse the outside of the cup and the dish, inside you are filled with plunder and evil. You fools! Did not the maker of the outside also make the inside?” For the one who has seen the truth revealed in Christ Jesus, there is no inside/outside; there is no secular/sacred; there is no public/private. There is the mind of Christ—the mind taken on at baptism and fed with the logic of the Word and the food of the Eucharist. There is the Body of Christ, the Church—the Church, our mother and teacher; one body, one faith, one reason. And there is the glory of God—the One Who cleaned the inside and the outside and made us worthy of His rescue. You know the Truth. Speak his Name. Inside and out: speak his Name.

*Yes, yes, yes. . . I know.  I am oversimplifying this BIG Time.  I know.  I also know that blaming Kant for western secularization is controversial.  But remember:  this is a homily. . .not a conference paper. 

Willful Ignorance? Can the LCWR listen to its critics?

Take some time today and give this article a careful read:  "Cross Examination:  Why is Rome Investigating U.S. Nuns?"   The author, Sister X, purports to be an ordinary religious sister who is genuinely confused about the reasons behind the Vatican's two on-going investigations: the quality of life for sisters and a theological assessment.

This article has two features that regularly show up in these sorts "we're so confused about these investigations" pieces:  1).  a failure to acknowledge the public and pervasive fall into radical feminist eco-paganism among some sisters and congregation; and 2).  a recitation of the tired feminist meme that these investigations are all about power-hungry men in Rome wanting to rein in unruly women religious. 

Right smack in the center of Sister X's piece is the absence of any sense at all that the theological assessment is a response to the LCWR's nearly 40 year history of public dissent not only from the Catholic magisterium but from just plain old Christianity itself!  Sister X minimizes the Vatican's concern: "Certain problems, Levada explained, needed to be addressed. As it turns out, these have to do with the LCWR’s alleged failure to express sufficiently rigorous doctrinal compliance with several recent church documents."  Yes, exactly, Sister. . .the Vatican is worried that when a sister is invited to the LCWR to give an address and in that address calls on your membership to "go beyond the Church. . .even beyond Christ himself" in their religious lives, the Vatican is worried that the LCWR is failing to express sufficiently rigorous doctrinal compliance.  Only in the insular world of eco-feminist religious women can the denial of Christ and his Church be construed as being insufficiently theologically rigorous. 

Another rhetorical move in these articles is to present the investigations as attempts by the Vatican to rein in unruly religious women.   Apparently, the Evil Old Power Hungry Testosterone Poisoned Prelates in the Vatican have been so juiced about oppressing nuns and sisters in the U.S. that it's taken them nearly 40 years to get around to asking a few questions about what these women really believe as self-professed Catholics.  Sarcasm aside, my point is simple:  if reining in unruly women is the objective of these investigations, why has it taken 40 years to start? 

What's most astonishing to me about this piece is the complete absence of any sense of responsibility on the part of these women for the decline and fall of women's religious life in the US.  Sister X blames just about everyone in sight but will not look in the mirror and point.  Religious women spend a great deal of time at their conferences and retreats patting themselves on the back for their courage, for telling the truth to power, for being open to difference, etc.  Good!  Are they courageous enough to devote their next LCWR meeting to speakers who will offer then substantial critiques of what they have done to religious life in the last 40 years?  LCWR constantly harps on the meme that the Vatican doesn't listen to them.  Do they listen to their critics?  Do they embody what they want from the Church? 

I think 99% of religious women could do just that.  But I doubt the institutional pros who haunt the inner-workings of the LWCR could.  

The peace of the grave

 from Doctor Zero at HotAir:

The cultural and political elite of Europe is delighted to give Obama an award for his bold work in turning America into the same kind of dilettante basket case they are. The people who sat helplessly and watched the slaughter in Bosnia may come to regret sacrificing their last shred of credibility to shore up a weak President, so he can finish the task of hobbling the only nation on Earth that can do a damned thing to prevent a slaughter. Europe thinks it can do business with the Islamic fascism creeping through its streets, but it will find any deals it makes with them have expiration dates, as surely as all of Barack Obama’s promises do. When they once again turn to America to save them, they had better hope we’ve had the wisdom to replace the confused and helpless man clutching his shiny Nobel Peace Prize with someone who can saddle up and ride to the rescue. Negotiation without principle is submission, and the only peace brought by submission is the peace of the grave.

Galileo was tortured and other myths about science and religion

Some few HancAquam Followers have suggested that I begin a book review column, maybe once a week or so.  Though this is a good idea, I doubt very seriously that most of my readers would want to read reviews of Subjectivity, Objectivity, and Intersubjectivity, or Philosophical Dialectics:  an essay on metaphilosophy, etc.  Anyway, I read one fascinating book this summer that I think a number of you might enjoy.  Below is an excellent review from Mark Kalthoff posted at First Things:

Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths about Science and Religion

edited by Ronald L. Numbers

Harvard , 302 pages, $27.95

We all know the aphorism—“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble, but what you think you know that just ain’t so.”

Now, thanks to the historical sleuthing of eminent science historian Ronald Numbers and his cadre of two-dozen “myth-busters,” we have ample evidence that much received wisdom concerning the historical relations between science and religion has caused real intellectual trouble because it just ain’t so. The book’s title names one of the iconic myths from a canon of false claims in the history of Western science. The volume contains twenty-five such guffaws in all, each with its own brief chapter devoted to defusing the myth. One by one they fall, beginning with the “greatest myth,” the notion that the history of encounters between science and religion is a tale of “constant conflict.”

The volume’s careful organization and execution reveal the kind of planning and teamwork absent from too many edited collections, but which have come to be expected from Numbers. Each chapter of Galileo Goes to Jail begins with two or three epigraphs that clearly convict scholarly and popular literature of perpetuating the myth in question. Most authors then explore the nuances of the myth, its origin, complexity, and longevity, before telling the “rest of the story.”

Was Galileo imprisoned and tortured for advocating Copernicanism? Of course not, despite the fact that the clueless and ignorant persist in recycling all those long-ago discredited accounts.

Nor did medieval Christians teach that the earth was flat, nor did Copernicanism demote humans from the middle of the cosmos. Further, Darwin neither destroyed natural theology nor inspired Nazi biology nor converted back to Christianity on his deathbed. And depending upon the company one keeps, some think they know that Christianity gave birth to modern science while others are sure that the scientific revolution liberated science from religion. Neither happened.

From the Church Fathers’ encounter with ancient science to the recent attempts of new-age mystics to coopt quantum physics, this volume has something to intrigue and instruct both popular and academic readers, whatever their theological tradition.

While a couple chapters do little more than tear down mythical straw men and another is overly derivative from previous publications, these are minor weaknesses. Numbers and his colleagues have successfully called propaganda by its real name and demonstrated, in the words of one contributor, that “history fails to be reliable whenever it neglects to show us the world as it looked to the historical actors themselves.”

—Mark A. Kalthoff

Nobel Cmte: 3 Left Liberals, 2 Liberals

Ah, now it makes sense. . . the whole Barry as Nobel Prize winner thing. . .the selection cmte was dominated by Euro-lefties who love his Hate America First diplomacy:

". . .a peek at the backgrounds of the five people who made the selection gives a clue why the prize panel would be so favorably disposed to Obama – three of them would be considered hard-left liberals in American politics. One of those belongs to Norway’s Socialist Left party.

And all five people on the committee are politicians selected by the Norwegian parliament, and generally hew to a Norwegian view of foreign affairs — internationalist in outlook and with a broad affinity for Obama’s posture on the world stage."

And don't let the red herring that two cmte members belonged to Norway's version of the GOP fool you. . .conservatives in Europe are simply slightly less emphatic about their socialism than their opponents.

Nobel Prize for Barry the Neophyte: what say you?

B.O. wins the Nobel Peace Prize! Your reaction?
	'Bout time...it's been what...like nine months?
	Perhaps premature but nonetheless deserved
	An indication of great things to come...soon...I hope.
	Diminishes the Prize with obvious political manipulation
	How do amateurs rates international prizes?
	It's not like he writes his own speeches...or even makes actual decisions or anything
	Norwegian a$$ kissers...give me the prize in chemisty for peeing on a tree
pollcode.com free polls

Mockery, disgrace, farce--all come to mind. . .

Nobel Peace Prize and $1.50 will get you a small coffee at McDonald's.

Well, it's not like it means much after they gave to it carbon-hog, Pope Gore I of the Church of Global Warming.

Someone, please. . .tell me, how does one rate a Nobel Peace Prize when one has only been eligible for said prize for two weeks?

I do believe that someone is worried about not getting enough Obamass-kissing in before the holidays!

Now, a humble man, one who truly understands his accomplishments and acknowledges the limits of his influence, would turn this prize down. . .and wait until it is truly deserved.  Will B.O. turn it down?  Of course not!  He thinks he was born deserving this prize.  (FYI:  if he turns it down--despite my pessimistic predictions--I will apologize right here on this blog.  AND I will apologize sincerely. . .I'm used to having to be reminded that humility is the best road.)  But in my long experience working with borderline personality disordered patients, all of whom were clinical narcissists, I'm willing to bet this month's stipend that B.O. can't resist this wholly undeserved prize.  He will accept and use "I" and "me" in more than 50% of the acceptance speech.

I just sent an email to the Nobel Prize Cmte expressing my dismay at this absurd degradation of the Peace Prize.  I would encourage all of you to do the same:  postmaster@nobel.no