“If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress. … Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America.” – James Madison¹

“Catholic teaching on subsidiarity and the American tradition of federalism – to say nothing of simple realism about what happens when large state bureaucracies get extensive power – should here join hands in proper wariness about the unintended consequences of efforts to do good.” – Robert Royal¹

“Given his selfish nature, man must internalize some reason to behave in pro-social ways. That fact that he falls short of these values does not mean he is a hypocrite. The one who does not even believe what he says is the hypocrite. The one who believes what he says and falls short is merely human.” – Dr. Mike Adams¹

The Church teaches that life begins at conception. Why then does it surprise good, orthodox priests that a miscarried baby should get a funeral? It bothers me greatly.

The National Catholic Register provides the scientific facts behind the Pope’s recent statement that there is a risk of increasing the problem of AIDS in Africa by distributing condoms.¹ This article provides documentation to some of the things I had considered myself when I have found myself defending the Church’s position, as well as bringing up a few things I had not thought of. The long and short of it is, unsurprisingly, that the available empirical research demonstrates that, for one reason or another, you simply cannot remove the risk from “casual sex.” Only “partner reduction” or better yet “abstinence or being mutually faithful with an uninfected partner are the most effective ways of avoiding infection.”²

This¹ comes only a week or so after I finished the book, Lord of the World² that it compares President Obama to. The author writes reflecting much the same line of thought that I had as I wrote it.

Other than the fact that the “planes” in the book flap wings, and the references to esperanto, the book is rather eerie when you think about it having been written in 1906 or so.

Periodically when I follow the RSS link to Dr. Mike Adams’ articles, I end up somewhere else. This time, I read the entire article before I realized it.

It seems that Dr. Dawkins has again accepted an invitation to debate a theist. This time, it further appears that he tried to rig the debate, and deny his opponent a real opportunity to refute his theory. Picking a columnist with this hope proves to be foolish. Mr. Dinesh D’Souza shows how Dr. Dawkins stumbled in thinking that Mr. D’Souza would not have a chance to refute his (Dr. Dawkins’) poor logic.¹ Dr. Dawkins excuse is probably that as this happened on Al-Jazeera, and not a more reputable news source, his slip will be missed.

PS: Judging from the datestamp in the URL, I would say that Dr. Dawkins was correcting in assuming his slip would be missed by most people.

Boston College’s president has made the executive decision to place a crucifix in each of the classrooms on campus.¹ While it is reported that student responses are generally positive, the faculty is apparently deeply divided and upset.² I suppose the good news is that the younger generation is at least apparently somewhat more open to faith than the older. The bad news is that the older will be teaching the younger.

This¹ article corresponds well with some of the stuff that Fr. Philip Chavez² has said. The ideas are not identical, but they fit together. This is good.

Dr. Mike Adams quotes Saint Jude’s Epistle several times in his article, “St. Jude, Don’t Make it Bad”¹. I need to read it. I need to read more non-fiction in general.