A.S. Haley: Diocese of Virginia is an Emperor without Clothes

Thanks to BabyBlue, we learn that the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia, barely a week after its Bishop held out the olive branch to the departed CANA parishes, used his other hand to hit them with a sucker punch: his attorneys have filed a motion with Judge Randy Bellows for an award of prejudgment interest. (You can read the text of the motion and supporting memorandum at the link to BabyBlue's post.)

"Prejudgment interest" means just what the name says -- it is interest on an amount made payable for a time period before any actual judgment is entered. (After a judgment is entered against a defendant for a sum of money, postjudgment interest begins to accrue on the amount of the judgment, and continues to accrue until the judgment is paid in full.)

How can interest accrue on an amount before it is awarded? Well, first of all, the amount has to be known and certain -- that is, the claim against the defendant has to be for a specific sum of money which is already known, or is readily ascertainable. For example, if I offer you $10,000 to paint my house, but then delay paying you after you have finished the job, so that you eventually are forced to sue and get a judgment against me for the $10,000, then you could ask the court to award (prejudgment) interest on the unpaid amount from the day you finished the job until the day the court entered judgment. (Once the judgment is entered, postjudgment interest takes over from there.) the rest

Yes, Bishop Johnston, certainly you are following those "contingency plans"; certainly you are "prepared for any eventuality." You just need the prejudgment interest to bolster the amounts you will have available to keep up these properties until you can turn them into more cash to pay back the line of credit you took out to finance the lawsuits; we see that. That is why you now really want to stick it to your fellow Christians, and make them atone with every last drop of their blood for the offense they gave the Diocese by having the temerity to seek what they thought were their rights under Virginia law at the time.

My Smart Phone Made Me Stupid

BlimeyCow YouTube channel

•Sexual promiscuity costing UK billions of pounds

January 31st, 2012

A culture of sexual license and promiscuity in the UK is costing the taxpayer approximately £100 billion per year, according to findings by the Jubilee Centre.

In a paper entitled nbsp;  “Free sex: Who pays? Moral hazard and sexual ethics”, it’s argued that sex is widely seen as an activity which only affects the couple involved.

However, the report found that sexual freedom has significant costs which are “imposed on society as a whole”, representing “a moral hazard which threatens both our economy and our society.”

The paper warns of a culture which “implicitly views sexual freedom as a greater good than stability of relationship”, causing rising trends in abortion, teenage pregnancies and STI rates, all of which cost the taxpayer large sums of money.

“Our culture’s sexual freedom comes with massive costs attached, accounting for a significant proportion of public spending”, the report claims.

“These costs are met by society collectively rather than by the individuals most directly involved in causing them.” the rest

Washington Post Ombudsman: Worst March for Life Coverage Ever

by Tim Graham
1/31/12

In his Sunday column, Washington Post ombudsman Patrick Pexton agreed with readers who felt the Post “downsized” the massive “March for Life” by failing to show broad crowd shots. Pexton quoted AP that it’s “consistently one of the largest protests of the year in Washington” and “One observer e-mailed that he stood at the Supreme Court and it took marchers two hours to walk by. That’s a big crowd.”

Pexton failed to compare this massive crowd – and the Post’s failure to write more than one story (in Metro) on it – to the Post’s slobbering love affair with the Occupy DC protests that have spread far and wide across the liberal newspaper. Pexton found the Post photo editor sneering that pro-lifers can never be pleased:

But no one knows how big it was….Still, you can find images of the large crowd taken by amateurs on Flickr or Facebook, and I imagine the AP took some, too. Probably Post photographers did as well.

But these shots didn’t find their way into the main Web photo gallery on the march. And I think this is where The Post fell down in its coverage of the march this year. And that’s mostly what antiabortion readers wrote to me about. the rest



Best. 2012. March for Life. Video. Ever.

GetReligion: Missing March for Life photos discovered

Christ Church Episcopal seeks contempt against sister congregation

February 1, 2012
By Jan Skutch

Christ Church Episcopal may be back home in its Johnson Square building, but squabbling over church property continues.

The Episcopal Diocese of Georgia and Christ Church Episcopal on Monday asked Chatham County Superior Court Chief Judge Michael Karpf to hold the Rev. Marcus Robertson and Christ Church Savannah in contempt of court.

They argue Robertson and Christ Church Savannah have failed to comply with a court order to return a $2 million endowment fund and other property after the two congregations agreed to the return of the historic Johnson Square property in December.

The civil action alleges Christ Church Savannah, the Anglican congregation, has refused to relinquish control of such items as the endowment fund held by the Savannah Bank, corporate, business and other records, the domain name and website www.christchurchsavannah.org.

It also argues the Anglican congregation has failed to relinquish the names “Christ Church Savannah” and “The Mother Church of Georgia” despite three court rulings against them. the rest

Mass Sterilization

A Massachusetts judge revives a favorite old practice of the state's elites.
By Daniel J. Flynn
1.31.12

Can a judge, without even holding a hearing, order a woman sterilized in a state where compulsory sterilization has never been the law?

As North Carolina prepares to pay reparations to victims of its decades-long eugenics campaign, Massachusetts strangely enters a sterilization debate that most had thought long over. Norfolk County Probate and Family Court Judge Christina L. Harms earlier this month ordered that a bipolar and schizophrenic woman be "coaxed, bribed, or even enticed…by ruse" to abort her pregnancy and undergo sterilization. If the mentally ill woman were sane, the judge determined, she "would not choose to be delusional" and therefore, she would choose abortion.

Does "our bodies, our choice" still apply when we are not in our right minds?

The Michael Dukakis-appointed jurist abruptly retired following the controversial decision and a state appeals court overturned part of her ruling. "We reverse that portion of the order requiring sterilization," wrote Judge Andrew R. Grainger. "No party requested this measure, none of the attendant procedural requirements has been met, and the judge appears to have simply produced the requirement out of thin air." The reversal crucially noted, "In ordering sterilization sua sponte and without notice, the probate judge failed to provide the basic due process that is constitutionally required." The abortion order was also subsequently overturned by a separate court. the rest

Special Report: Mormonism besieged by the modern age

By Peter Henderson and Kristina Cooke
Tue Jan 31, 2012

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah - A religious studies class late last year at Utah State University in Logan, Utah, was unusual for two reasons. The small group of students, faculty and faithful there to hear Mormon Elder Marlin Jensen were openly troubled about the future of their church, asking hard questions. And Jensen was uncharacteristically frank in acknowledging their concerns.

Did the leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints know that members are "leaving in droves?" a woman asked.

"We are aware," said Jensen, according to a tape recording of his unscripted remarks. "And I'm speaking of the 15 men that are above me in the hierarchy of the church. They really do know and they really care," he said.

"My own daughter," he then added, "has come to me and said, 'Dad, why didn't you ever tell me that Joseph Smith was a polygamist?'" For the younger generation, Jensen acknowledged, "Everything's out there for them to consume if they want to Google it." The manuals used to teach the young church doctrine, meanwhile, are "severely outdated."

These are tumultuous times for the faith founded by Joseph Smith in 1830, and the rumbling began even before church member Mitt Romney's presidential bid put the Latter-Day Saints in the spotlight. the rest

Walk then in the spirit...

Walk then in the spirit, like Abraham, without knowing whither you go; be content with your daily bread, and remember that in the desert the manna of to-day could not be preserved until to-morrow without corrupting. The children of God must be shut up to the grace of the present moment, without desiring to foresee the designs of Providence concerning them.
 ...Francois Fenelon image by Mike McCune

Mainline Churches See Slowest Growth, Research Shows

Tue, Jan. 31 2012
By Michael Gryboski

Compared to other religious groups in the U.S., mainline denominations had the slowest growth rate with only 19 percent of their congregations reporting growth between 2005 and 2010, according to a researcher from The Episcopal Church.

By contrast, conservative Protestant churches had the highest growth rate at 43 percent, followed by non-Christian congregations with 33 percent.

C. Kirk Hardaway, Congregational Research Officer for the Episcopal Church and chairman of the research task force for the Cooperative Congregational Studies Partnership, presented the findings on Tuesday.

The research findings were based on surveys conducted by around 11,000 American congregations representing various Christian and non-Christian congregations. The growth rate of said congregations was measured from 2005 until 2010. Those filling out the survey were the leaders of the congregations, including clergy and laymen.

Hardaway attributed the strong growth of conservative Protestant churches to them being largely concentrated in the South, as well as having other attributes found in stronger churches that were measured by the research. This included more innovative worship practices, having a clearer mission and purpose, and having more newer congregations. the rest

Anglican Ink: TEC in One Word: DOWN

A.S. Haley: Episcopal Church Faces Budget and Structural Changes

Greece decides to 'pay child molesters'

Also included in the officially expanded list of "disabilities" are exhibitionists, kleptomaniacs, and pyromaniacs.
Charlie Butts
1/31/2012

Greece is now designating pedophilia as an infirmity, and one attorney deems it outrageous that such offenders will qualify for disability funds from the economically broken government.

According to Matt Barber of Liberty Counsel Action, it is an outrage that people will receive payments for their attraction to children. He says rewarding such an alleged "disability" is evidence that the "sexual anarchy movement" is running amok.

"This is the logical conclusion of what we can expect here in the United States with the sexual anarchy movement," he warns. "Part and parcel of that movement is the homosexual movement, the pedophile movement, the radical pro-abortion movement -- [and] those who push this idea of [values-neutral] comprehensive sex education ...." the rest

ObamaCare and Religious Freedom

How about some respect for Catholics and others who object to treating pregnancy as a disease?
By TIMOTHY M. DOLAN
JANUARY 25, 2012

Religious freedom is the lifeblood of the American people, the cornerstone of American government. When the Founding Fathers determined that the innate rights of men and women should be enshrined in our Constitution, they so esteemed religious liberty that they made it the first freedom in the Bill of Rights.

In particular, the Founding Fathers fiercely defended the right of conscience. George Washington himself declared: "The conscientious scruples of all men should be treated with great delicacy and tenderness; and it is my wish and desire, that the laws may always be extensively accommodated to them." James Madison, a key defender of religious freedom and author of the First Amendment, said: "Conscience is the most sacred of all property." the rest

Marco Rubio Introduces Bill to Reverse Contraception Mandate on Religious Employers

Religious Liberty and Civil Society

Obamacare’s Great Gift: Clarification
January 31, 2012
Elizabeth Scalia

...But HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and President Obama “botched” nothing. The decision put forth is a purposeful one, transparently provocative. If the administration had simply wanted to provide free contraception and sterilization to those who want it, they could have inserted that notion into any one of a number of spending or entitlement bills. Had they meant to demonstrate respect for conscience–and according to Archbishop Timothy Dolan the president said he “considered the protection of conscience sacred”–the administration could have taken the advice of others and looked closely at how Hawaii managed conscience exemptions under their law.

There are questions as to whether HHS has authority to issue exemptions to Obamacare, although quite a few have been issued for reasons other than conscience. There appear to be no questions in the president’s mind, or in Secretary Sebelius’, that they have the authority to intrude on freedom of religion. With this ruling they insist that church-affiliated institutions either act against their own belief or so narrow the scope of their community service as to be removed from the public square; either way, the government is deliberately affecting the free exercise of religion. Considering some Catholic schools, hospitals and charities were serving their communities before the secular governments even thought to follow suit, that is a damnable, and damning, legacy for a president who once taught constitutional law...  Full essay

Mohler says insurance mandate not just 'Catholic' issue
By Bob Allen
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (ABP) – A Southern Baptist seminary president applauded Roman Catholic bishops for refusing to obey an insurance mandate forcing employers to offer coverage for contraceptives and sterilization, and predicted that evangelical leaders will soon face similar choices.

“Our religious liberty is being similarly subverted and attacked,” Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said of the Obama administration’s inclusion of pregnancy in “preventive services” that health insurers must provide.

In his daily podcast briefing Jan. 31, Mohler commented on a letter from bishops read in Catholic churches Jan. 27 stating in part, “We cannot -- we will not -- comply with this unjust law.”  the rest

WH:‘No Constitutional Rights Issue’ in Forcing Catholics to Act Against Their Faith

Komen to Stop Grants to Planned Parenthood Abortion Biz

by Steven Ertelt
1/31/12

After years of protests and criticism from pro-life advocates, the biggest breast cancer organization, Susan G. Komen for the Cure has announced it is halting further grants and donations to the Planned Parenthood.

Figures from August directly from the Komen for the Cure foundation show 18 affiliates of the breast cancer charity gave a total of more than $569,000 to the Planned Parenthood abortion business in 2010. That was down from the $731,303 Komen officials publicly confirmed in October 2010, when they acknowledged that 20 of the 122 Komen affiliates gave to Planned Parenthood during the 2009 fiscal year.

Now, Komen says it is halting all grants because of public pressure from pro-life groups and due to the impending investigation in Congress of the Planned Parenthood abortion business.

The policy makes it so no further Planned Parenthood grants will be given unless the investigation results in Planned Parenthood’s favor.
the rest

Susan G. Komen and Planned Parenthood
...Every time a woman has an abortion and part of the money to fund that center staying open came from Komen, they are putting women at a greater risk for breast cancer...

Yet Another Study Links Abortion and Breast Cancer Risk

Fifty-one of 68 epidemiological studies since 1957 report an abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link (not counting biological and experimental evidence). found here

Canada: Afghan Family Found Guilty in Honor Killings

By AP
Monday, Jan. 30, 2012

(KINGSTON, Ontario) — A jury on Sunday found three members of an Afghan family guilty of killing three teenage sisters and another woman in what the judge described as "cold-blooded, shameful murders" resulting from a "twisted concept of honor," ending a case that shocked and riveted Canadians.

Prosecutors said the defendants allegedly killed the three teenage sisters because they dishonored the family by defying its disciplinarian rules on dress, dating, socializing and using the Internet.

The jury took 15 hours to find Mohammad Shafia, 58; his wife Tooba Yahya, 42; and their son Hamed, 21, each guilty of four counts of first-degree murder. First-degree murder carries an automatic life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years. the rest

Ex-clinic manager becomes abortion protester

TONY LEYS
Jan. 28, 2012

Iowa abortion opponents have picked up a startling ally.

A longtime Storm Lake clinic manager for Planned Parenthood has switched sides, and she is speaking out against her former employer’s use of an electronic system to dispense abortion pills throughout the state.

“You couldn’t really write a story that’s as odd as all that’s happened,” Sue Thayer told about 150 activists Saturday at an Iowa Right to Life meeting in Des Moines.

Thayer, 52, said she ran Planned Parenthood’s Storm Lake clinic for more than 17 years before being fired in 2008. She believes she was dismissed because she’d raised questions about the agency’s remote-control system for providing abortion pills at small-town clinics. the rest

'Father' and 'Son' Ousted from the Trinity in New Bible Translations

By Hussein Hajji Wario
Fri, Jan 27, 2012

A controversy is brewing over three reputable Christian organizations, which are based in North America, whose efforts have ousted the words "Father" and "Son" from new Bibles. Wycliffe Bible Translators, Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) and Frontiers are under fire for "producing Bibles that remove "Father," "Son" and "Son of God" because these terms are offensive to Muslims."

Concerned Christian missionaries, Bible translators, pastors, and national church leaders have come together with a public petition to stop these organizations. They claim a public petition is their last recourse because meetings with these organizations' leaders, staff resignations over this issue and criticism and appeals from native national Christians concerned about the translations "have failed to persuade these agencies to retain "Father" and "Son" in the text of all their translations."

Biblical Missiology, a ministry of Boulder, Colorado-based Horizon International, is sponsoring the petition. the rest

Colson: Obama Admin. Restricting Religious Freedom

Fri, Jan. 27 2012
By Chuck Colson

I warned you that the Supreme Court's decision to grant religious groups a "ministerial exception" in hiring, while important, does nothing to halt the Obama Administration's relentless crusade to restrict religious freedom.

Just Friday, the Administration announced it would not expand exemptions for religiously affiliated organizations when it comes to insurance. So, a Catholic hospital, for instance, will be forced to purchase insurance for its employees that would provide free contraception and sterilization services.

Now, in case you didn't know, the Catholic Church teaches that using artificial contraception or undergoing sterilization are grave sins. The government now said, "Tough."

Even the liberal Washington Post sees this for what it is: a restriction of religious freedom. Its lead editorial called the Administration's decision, "wrong." the rest

UK: Girls as young as nine forced into Muslim marriages

January 27, 2012
by PAVAN AMARA

Excerpt:
IKWRO, which made headlines last month when they revealed there had been almost 3,000 “honour-based” violence cases in 2010, has shown the Tribune records which revealed at least three 11-year-old girls and two nine-year-olds had been forced into marriage with older men within Islington. The oldest girls involved were 16.

They have warned that hundreds of Islington girls could be suffering sexual, emotional and physical scars as a result of the child marriages every year and are calling for teachers, social workers and police to be better trained to spot and manage the abuse.

Information from the Ministry of Justice, following a Freedom of Information request, revealed that 32 Forced Marriage Protection Order applications were made for children under 16 in Britain last year.

Six of these were made for under-16s within Islington at the Royal Courts of Justice, although these were not necessarily made for Islington residents.

At the Islington court, “five or fewer” orders were made to protect children between the ages of 9-11.

The orders are a form of injunction that threaten legal punishment if marriage takes place due to emotional or physical force. the rest

Anglican congregations moving forward after losing church buildings

By Colette M. Jenkins
January 28, 2012

Excerpt:
The Holy Spirit congregation is among five Northeast Ohio parishes that were displaced after a Cuyahoga County Common Pleas judge ruled that the church properties they occupied belonged to the Episcopal Diocese of Ohio.

The five congregations — Holy Spirit; St. Luke’s, Fairlawn; St. Barnabas, Bay Village; St. Anne in the Fields, Madison; and Church of the Transfiguration, Cleveland — left the Episcopal Church in 2003 and realigned with the Anglican Communion.

The split grew from disagreements over biblical teaching on salvation and other issues, including homosexuality. After the Episcopal Church consecrated its first openly gay bishop, V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, in 2003, some of the more theologically conservative parishes, including the five in Northeast Ohio, disaffiliated from the Episcopal Church and realigned themselves with Anglican organizations that share their views on issues like homosexuality.

In March 2008, the diocese sued, asking the county court to declare that the property associated with the five parishes belongs to the diocese and the Episcopal Church. Last April, the court ruled in favor of the Episcopal Church and the diocese. Several months later, the Anglican congregations began vacating the buildings.

All five congregations have been taken in by other churches — Church of the Transfiguration worships at a former Methodist building on Martin Luther King Drive in Cleveland; St. Anne’s worships in the youth center at Cornerstone Friends Church in Madison and St. Barnabas, now Christ Church Westshore, has weekday services at Bay Presbyterian Church Westshore and a 10 a.m. Sunday service at Bay High School in Bay Village. the rest

Court: 'Tolerance is a two-way street'

Jody Brown, Charlie Butts, and Bob Kellogg
1/27/2012

The Sixth Circuit has ruled in favor of Christian graduate student Julea Ward, who almost three years ago was expelled from a university counseling program for her religious beliefs.

In a strongly worded opinion earlier today, the Sixth U.S. Circuit of Appeals reversed a district court decision in favor of Eastern Michigan University, sending it back for trial along with this message: "A reasonable jury could conclude that Ward's professors ejected her from the counseling program because of hostility toward her speech and faith ...."

As part of her counseling practicum course in early 2009, Ward had been assigned a potential client who was homosexual and was seeking affirmation of that sexual orientation. Because she was unwilling to violate her own religious beliefs in the context of the counseling relationship, Ward was permitted to refer the client to another counselor -- but was told to remain in the counseling program she would have to undergo a "remediation" program that would help her "see the error of her ways."

When Ward refused, a faculty committee dismissed her from the program. In her subsequent lawsuit, a district federal court ruled in favor of EMU -- a ruling that has now been reversed. the rest

"A university cannot compel a student to alter or violate her belief systems based on a phantom policy as the price for obtaining a degree ...," wrote the Sixth Circuit. "Why treat Ward differently? That her conflict arose from religious convictions is not a good answer; that her conflict arose from religious convictions for which the department at times showed little tolerance is a worse answer."

Rescued Hostage Buchanan Sold Her Belongings to Become Missionary

By ALYSSA NEWCOMB and DANA HUGHES
Jan. 25, 2012

Jessica Buchanan, the woman rescued from Somalia bandits by U.S. special forces, is so dedicated to helping others that she sold all of her belongings to become a missionary in Somalia.

Buchanan, 32, was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. She graduated from Valley Forge University, a Christian college in Phoenixville, Pa., in 2007. She was a student teacher in Africa before graduating and her romance with the continent began.

"She fell in love with Africa," Rev. Don Meyer, dean of Valley Forge University told the Associated Press. "She could hardly talk about Africa without tears in her eyes." the rest

Survey: Record number of Israeli Jews believe in God

First comprehensive study in a decade also shows that 70 percent of Israelis believe the Jews are the 'Chosen People.'
By Nir Hasson
27.01.12

Fully 80 percent of Israeli Jews believe that God exists - the highest figure found by the Guttman-Avi Chai survey since this review of Israeli-Jewish beliefs began two decades ago.

The latest survey of the "Beliefs, Observance and Values among Israeli Jews" was conducted in 2009 but the results were released only on Thursday, after a detailed analysis had been completed. The two previous surveys were in 1999 and 1991.

The study also found that 70 percent of respondents believe the Jews are the "Chosen People," 65 percent believe the Torah and mitzvot (religious commandments ) are God-given, and 56 percent believe in life after death. the rest

Clergyman jailed for sham marriage scam

An Anglican clergyman who advised the Church of England on how to handle sham marriages has been jailed for two and a half years for conducting dozens of the illegal ceremonies himself.
By John Bingham
26 Jan 2012

The Revd Canon Dr John Magumba married a stream of Nigerian men to EU citizens giving them a “golden ticket” to stay in Britain, a court heard.

At one point he was conducting so many weddings involving foreigners that he was put him in charge of a committee of diocesan working party on how to handle the issue – including how to spot sham relationships, Bolton Crown Court heard.

He "asked no questions" despite a dramatic surge in African men choosing his churches in Greater Manchester to marry Polish, Slovak or Czech women. the rest

Woman set to marry building undeterred by demolition work

Jan 26, 2012

SEATTLE -- Bruised or not, she says she'll marry her beloved building as planned come Sunday.

Babylonia Aivaz's bride-to-be is a 107-year-old warehouse that sits at 10th and Union in the Capitol Hill neighborwood. She has been planning to enter into what she described as "a gay marriage" with the building.

"If corporations can have the rights as people, so can buildings," said Aivaz, referencing a Supreme Court decision on political advertising. "I'm doing this to show the building how much I love it, how much I love community space and how much I love this neighborhood. And I want to stop it from gentrification.” the rest

"Yes, I'm in love with a 107 year old building! Yes, ITS A GAY MARRIAGE! How is that possible? Well there must obviously be a deeper story," she wrote.

Church of the Holy Trinity (Anglican) Syracuse, NY

I am posting this info until we get the new website for Church of the Holy Trinity up and running! -PD

 

Bp. Julian Dobbs and Fr. Chris Moellering, Vicar

Church of the Holy Trinity

2002 Teall Ave.

Syracuse, NY 13208 Map

315 422-4503

 Holy Eucharist:   Sundays at 10:00 AM
Adult Sunday School at 9:00 AM

Please join us!

Church of the Holy Trinity is an Anglican Church and a member of the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA) and the Anglican Church in North America. 

Biblical + Liturgical + Spirit-filled

Watch for a new Website soon!

Fr. Jeffrey Altman, Bp. Dobbs, Fr. Chris Moellering

Sunday service at 10:00 AM

Look for this sign!

Map

A hidden cause of Baltimore's population loss: abortion

City's rate of terminated pregnancies is indicative of a wayward society
January 23, 2012
By Diana Schaub

Excerpt:
The decline of marriage, particularly among African-Americans, is all too familiar. Not as well-known is that Maryland has a very high abortion rate (third highest among the states in 2005, the year that the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene stopped collecting abortion statistics). The breakdown by jurisdiction reveals that Baltimore City is driving those deadly numbers, and also that the abortion rate among African-American women is at least triple the white rate.

Even for those in favor of legal abortion, the situation should be dismaying. And it certainly represents what Montesquieu termed "a change of customs." For comparison: In 1970, Baltimore City abortion rates for single white and black women stood at 7.43 and 10 respectively (the abortion rate is the number of abortions per 1,000 women ages 15-44), with the married women's rates half that. By 2005, the Baltimore rate was 86.2. The National Abortion Rights Action League, which cites that figure, did not provide the African-American rate, but it would be substantially higher.

Lest one think that poverty accounts for this shift, the poverty rate in Baltimore has remained relatively fixed at around 20 percent for decades. The marriage dearth and the abortion deluge among all races are not attributable to material causes as much as moral causes: young women's loss of respect for themselves as the bearers of new life and their resulting willingness to treat abortion as a method of contraception. the rest

Vatican official warns pope of corruption

January 25, 2012

VATICAN CITY — An Italian news program has obtained letters from a top Vatican official to the pope in which he begs not to be transferred after exposing corruption in the awarding of Vatican contracts that cost the Holy See millions of euros (dollars).

Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano was removed in October as the No. 2 administrator of the Vatican city-state and was named the pope's ambassador to Washington. While the job is highly prestigious, the posting took Vigano far from headquarters and out of the running for the Vatican's top administrative job, which carries with it the rank of cardinal.

The investigative news program "The Untouchables" on the private La7 network broadcast a series of letters Vigano sent Pope Benedict XVI and the secretary of state last year in which he claimed to have exposed corruption and abuse of office in the running of the Vatican's administration. the rest

Steven Spielberg Near Commitment To Direct Moses Epic For Warner Bros

By NIKKI FINKE AND MIKE FLEMING
Wednesday January 25, 2012

Steven Spielberg is near to etching in stone with Warner Bros on that biopic portraying the Jewish leader as the warrior to beat all warriors. With a working title of Gods And Kings, what’s envisioned is “a movie like a Braveheart-ish version of the Moses story,” an insider tells me. “Him coming down the river, being adopted, leaving his home, forming an army, and getting the Ten Commandments.” And despite the awesome screen possibilities of the parting of the Red Sea, the movie isn’t being contemplated in 3D. Back in 1956, Paramount release The Ten Commandments in VistaVision to give moviegoers a more spectacular experience of scenes like that. But this film is as far from a remake of the Cecile B. DeMille-directed epic as you can get even though they cover similar ground. Instead Warner Bros wants Speilberg to direct it with the gritty reality of Saving Private Ryan, which is considered a masterpiece redefining battle movies. ”There have been glossy versions of the Moses story but this would be a real warrior story,” an insider tells me.

The studio has wanted Spielberg on the project since last September when he first read the script. (See previous, Warner Bros Goes To The Mountaintop For Moses Epic.) Getting Spielberg seemed a long shot because his deals are always complex and his dance card is always full. Talks intensified, and now insiders tell me the dialogue should consummate by the end of the month. Warner Bros wants to start production sometime in March or April of 2013. the rest

Anglican Unscripted Episode 25

Jan 25, 2012

Yosemite timelapse HD

Yosemite HD from Project Yosemite on Vimeo.

Project Yosemite

US Supreme Court backs religious independence in surprise decision

The unanimous decision is a major setback for the Obama Administration.
James S. Cole
Monday, 23 January 2012

Earlier this month, the US Supreme Court decided a case filed by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and a teacher against a church-operated grade school in Michigan. Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, No. 10-553 (January 11, 2012). (The Slip Opinion, the official pre-publication version of the Court’s decision, is available on-line here.) The Supreme Court's 9-0 decision in favor of the First Amendment is a noteworthy setback to the anti-religious campaign waged by the Obama Administration in the law.

Hosanna-Tabor is a congregation of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod that "called" Ms Perich to teach in its school. To be “called,” a teacher had to complete eight college-level courses in aspects of Lutheran theology and obtain the approval of the local District of the LCMS. After that training and approval, once a congregation “called” the teacher, the teacher was employed indefinitely and was commissioned as a minister in the church. Duties as a teacher included teaching religion, leading a prayer service in class, and occasionally organizing larger religious services for the entire school. The school also employed “lay” teachers, who were not considered ministers and had year-to-year contracts. the rest

'Do not touch me': the wisdom of Anglican thresholds

By Stephen Hough

January 25th, 2012

This past Sunday I went to Westminster Abbey to attend Evensong, their superb choir conducted by James O'Donnell and accompanied by Robert Quinney. Woven between Thomas Cranmer's matchless words was music of Herbert Howells, William Byrd and a sparkling anthem by Jonathan Dove. If you are visiting London and want a perfect slice of England there's no better place to go.

The Church of England's evening service, adapted after the Reformation from the monastic hour of Vespers, is a wondrous phenomenon. Even the word 'Evensong' is poetic, and it seems to chime in perfect harmony with England's seasons: Autumn's melancholy, early evening light; the merry crackle of Winter frost; Spring's awakening, or the lazy, protracted sun strained through the warmed windows of a Summer afternoon.

Evensong hangs on the wall of English life like a old, familiar cloak passed through the generations. Rich with prayer and Scripture, it is nevertheless totally nonthreatening. It is a service into which all can stumble without censure – a rambling old house where everyone can find some corner to sit and think, to listen with half-attention, trailing a few absentminded fingers of faith or doubt in its passing stream.
 the rest image by Herry Lawford

Child sacrifice in 21st Century America

Jan 25, 2012
George Weigel

The Hebrew Bible is not for the squeamish. And its harshest maledictions are called down upon those who practiced the abomination of child-sacrifice.

Thus the Psalmist:

“They sacrificed their sons and daughters to the demons/they poured out innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; and the land was polluted with blood./Thus they became unclean by their acts, and played the harlot in their doings./Then the anger of the LORD was kindled against his people, and he abhorred his heritage./… they were rebellious in their purposes, and were brought low because of their iniquity” (Psalm 106:38-40, 43).

And the prophet Ezekiel, delivering the word of the Lord:

“And you took your sons and your daughters, whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your harlotries so small a matter that you slaughtered my children and delivered them up as an offering by fire to them?... Behold, therefore, I stretched out my hand against you, and diminished your allotted portion, and delivered you to the greed of your enemies…” (Ezekiel 16:20-21, 27).

Thirty-nine years after Roe v. Wade created an unrestricted abortion license in the United States, and during the week when hundreds of thousands of Americans pray and march for life, all Americans ought to ponder these words—and the kind of country to which Roe v. Wade led. the rest

Detaching biology from marriage and parenthood

Washington State House Judiciary Testimony
January 23, 2012

Church of England attendance decreasing, continuing downward trend

Wednesday, 25 January 2012

The latest statistics from the Church of England show a two per cent drop in attendance between 2009 and 2010.

Average Sunday attendance fell from 944,400 in 2009 to 923,700 the following year, continuing the long-term downward trend.

The number of children and young people at weekly services also dropped by two per cent, from 223,000 in 2009 to 218,600 in 2010.

Marriages rose in the Church of England by four per cent, from 52,730 in 2009 to 54,700 in 2010.

It is the biggest increase in marriages in any one year in the last decade and follows the launch of a range of initiatives designed to make marrying in the Church of England easier. the rest

More weddings, but fewer worshippers on average