Safe Haven

 Guns get juxtaposed with abortion. “If right-wingers really cared about…” “If they were REALLY pro-life, they would…” Go ahead. Make the argument.  First off, you don’t really want to compare the scale of this. 60 or 70 million unborn children killed. If I gave you every suicide and counted it like a school shooting, the scale would still be massively in the right-winger’s favor. Abortion is the worst genocide in human history. It should pre-empt every regular program on TV, like a daily 9/11, but worse, but it won’t. Too many “well-meaning” people would have to face their guilt and their complicity. Too many women would have to face the self-infantilization that makes them murderers. We have to sit with that last word: murderers. It’s “extreme” to say that, you say? Murder is the unjustified taking of an innocent human life. What is it, if it’s not that? What is it? We’re rightly all relieved that the Fort Hood shooter won’t be immortalized on video in death. It’s monstrous,...

 Which isn’t to say that I never did. And I’m reasonably happy if the Chiefs and Travis Kelce win. That makes Empress Taylor happy, so who am I to argue with her? But it started with the conspiracy to move the Rams from St. Louis back to Los Angeles. That hurt. And it’s clear that the NFL has known about traumatic brain injuries due to football for a lot longer than they let on. I just can’t really enjoy it without my conscience bothering me. So I just don’t. I understand football better than most fans. I just don’t see value in watching anymore.

 You know, the Zac Brown Band song. I love that song. I like songs like it. Maybe I’ve been sad a lot in life; I don’t know. I understand that I’m sappier than a forest of maple trees. I knew Aaron The Rat would know it. For all you know, he wrote the bloody song himself. It’s just one of those songs. Fairly sure I know every word. Though the second word in the first line is “trade,” not “take.” It sounds like “take.” Though that would mean he would have said “take” twice in that first line. So OK. Zac Brown is the kind of guy who’s been listening to James Taylor all his life, and became a musician. (In fact, they sang “Colder Weather” with James Taylor on an awards show.) Ordinarily, dance-pop doesn’t break your heart, unless it’s a-ha. I digress. Here’s the first line of “Colder Weather”: “She’d trade Colorado if he’d take her with him.” — It’d better be a good song, because it’s not “Baby One More Time.” This ain’t “Rhythm Of The Night” by DeBarge. As soon as he starts, you are ...

 Precisely one day after the pope reaffirmed CCC, 2267 on the death penalty--especially in light of the justified furor of the US president and the Department of Defense (not blessing the name change) announced they're going to livestream the execution of the Ft. Hood shooter--the pope announced that he's got a concerning nodule on one lung, and that doctors advised him to let them remove it. I never actually saw The Butterfly Effect, but it was a film about how a small action can have a totally unexpected impact on others and things. Far be it for me to guess at the workings of Providence, but it seems like this struggle for Pope Leo has provided many Catholics and separated Christians another opportunity to love and pray for him. As a side-note, when I say that I don't care what other Christians say about ethics or doctrine, I don't mean it strictly; I only mean that we're the Church founded by Jesus Christ; Peter is going to lead, even if other scattered disciple...

 Chris Coghlan is a British Member of Parliament for Dorking and Horley. The Liberal Democratic Party. There was apparently an assisted dying bill there. I assume that all the Catholic faithful were warned not to support it, and especially not elected officials. He did it anyway. Not that euthanasia has been a mystery for any of us for a couple hundred years. The Catechism is the most publicly available document ever, perhaps. I know Coughlan has WiFi, if he doesn’t want to read it in book form. Let’s cut the crap: these Catholic-flavored pagans the world over just want the Church to mind her own business. They like Christmas and Easter Mass. They might even enjoy talking about how Catholic they are. They can go on about all the parish events they’ve gone to, or how many years they went to Catholic school. But as soon as the powerful money people come around, these major issues become “wedge issues” and “divisive” and these folks need to “listen” to “other voices.” This particular ...

 The other aspect of all this discussion that gets missed is if I say, “I agree with the Church; the popes are clear in saying something that I should pay attention to, and in fact, that I understand,” I am not saying that I have a fondness for particular defendants, or a particular antipathy toward anyone who prosecuted them, etc. In fact, that’s how principles help us: passions can deceive; faith guided by reason cannot. I don’t know about you, but I always hated when someone said with abortion, “I’m pro-life, but…” We’ve all known that everything after the “but” would be unreasonable. You can’t decide moral issues on vibes. I’m not saying abortion is equivalent to capital punishment, because it isn’t. I am saying that if I understand capital punishment to be inadmissible, if that’s the ethics of the Church in light of human dignity, I don’t have to go case-by-case. We’re just not gonna do this, we’re not supporting it, and my emotions either way don’t matter. I know even a lot o...

 I never want to forget that he was my favorite player. Tom Brady eventually inspired joy, awe, and respect, and few dare even to doubt his place in the GOAT discussion. But before Brady, there was Favre. He was literally the people's quarterback. Even the fact that he's the all-time leader in interceptions thrown didn't seem to bother us. I think I liked him more. By the way, I feel the same about Favre as I do President George W. Bush: Don't bother me with criticisms, because I don't care. I'm not his priest or the pope. Mrs. Favre hasn't abandoned him, so I figure I don't have to dig deeply into his life. I usually don't get down about being disabled and a wheelchair user anyway, but Brett made me forget it all, anyway. And if it was effective propaganda, it worked. I felt a part of every success he had. With apologies to Peyton Manning, Brett Favre should have been the NFL MVP in 2009. If memory serves, he threw 33 touchdowns and 7 interceptions,...

 In the end, the guilty man is certain to die. It’s not my role to advocate to save his life. The Catholic Church now stands against capital punishment. I have no problem assimilating that reasoning and its conclusion into my thinking. I was a dedicated abolitionist 5 years before I submitted to the Bishop of Rome, to that faith, and to the philosophical tradition that undergirds it. None of the popes in my lifetime have opposed it for frivolous or personal reasons. Even were I unbound by anything in that ordinary magisterium, I should still prefer the pope’s opinion to my own. I have family members who disagree, but their place in Heaven is far from assured, for one. For another, “I love you” and “Your commitment to reason is in question” are not mutually exclusive. And we stand to be changed for the worse by this outcome, and especially if we watch it. And I believe God will hold anyone who celebrates it to account. Even in the days before the Christian teaching stood against it,...

 Catholics can have conversations among themselves concerning the ingenuity of a living Magisterium that can answer higher order questions that the Bible text itself cannot answer, because the purposes of it and parts of it are legion. But as a matter of faith, the relevant questions are these: Did Jesus establish a visible Church united in governance, sacraments, and profession? Is your local Catholic parish a current outpost of that Church? What might I expect to find if the answer were "yes"? What would invalidate the claim, or at least serve as a significant rebuttal to the claim? You see, it doesn't actually matter if one paradigm of the story of God interacting with humanity has features that someone finds appealing or advantageous. The only real question is whether Jesus established that putative Church and the features that are helpful, advantageous, or however you might describe them. Christianity and religions related to it presuppose that God reveals things tha...

 I’m not fond of loud noises. I have CP, and it gives me a startle response for sounds at 85 decibels or even less. Guns, buzzers, even squeaky HVAC systems. I’ll even mute Caitlin Clark and the Fever, if the substitution sound is “wrong.” I definitely could have enjoyed a Nuggets game with Tom Darrow, but only with earplugs. Good on them and others for creating “quiet rooms” for autistic people with sensory issues. I don’t have that diagnosis, but there’s some overlap. If I ever meet up with the “Mafia” in Iowa, the lot of them will probably go shoot guns, and I will meet the Crosses in Cedar Rapids. Aaron The Rat definitely knows his way around a firearm. C’mon. He even looks like a guy who teaches gun safety courses. We’re definitely making him drive to Iowa. I can’t think of anyone better to sponsor him as he (hopefully) will be assimilated into the Borg—let the reader understand—than Bryan and Carol Cross. Bryan’s fine, obviously. He’s a dear friend. But do you remember how Mi...

 I’m liberal enough, with enough awareness that the American involvement in transatlantic slavery—even pre-USA—was uniquely bad enough that it still has an impact today. It’s not wrong to feel bad about it; it’s not wrong to wish it never happened.  I’m conservative enough to think that the outcome of your life—insofar as you have agency—is down to you and no one else. Saw a thing on the Twitter of someone asking for opinions on interracial couples. To be clear, the picture was of a conventionally attractive white man and Black woman. No one seems to care if Asians marry non-Asians. I don’t think there’s much fuss about what Hispanic people do, though I could be wrong, and bigotry is horrifying. It was illegal in the United States for a man and woman in a mixed-race couple to marry until 1967. A person born in 1967 isn’t even old yet. My Mom spent most of that year being 11. So it’s not odd to me, but it’s still novel. If that a—hole Ray hadn’t killed MLK, there’s a chance you...

 When he played that 2007 US Open final against Novak Djokovic, he’d just turned 26. (Born August 8, 1981) I took him for granted in these prime years. We’re so used to speaking of his elegance and shot-making, but that narrative was cemented by him in his 30s and 40s, when his anticipation and variety hid the downtick in the savagery of his athleticism. You have to go back that far to find Novak Djokovic out of sorts. Roger was behind the whole time, but he knew the younger Djokovic would crack. This title was during his run of 5 consecutive US Open championships. When he lost to his rival and good friend Rafa Nadal at Wimbledon in 2008, Federer was contending for his sixth title there, consecutive. Remember that he won again on the grass in 2012, and again in 2017 (!). Even so, he lost 3 times to Djokovic there, culminating at Wimbledon 2019, at age 38, when he needed just one more shot to win his 9th title at the All England Club. The GOAT argument cannot be settled, and it neve...

 The Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis is suing ICE because they are denying priests access to those requesting sacraments in detention. That’s Missouri, by the way. Not Laredo, Texas, or southernmost California. Before we go on, I would like to add that I believe in law. I don’t believe that deportation is, of itself, wrong. But if I wouldn’t deny sacraments to a condemned prisoner in his or her last moments, what sense does it make to treat an illegal alien worse than a murderer? People seriously would rather be “conservative” (or liberal) than Christian, it seems. This whole focus on immigration itself seems wildly disproportionate, and certain federal officials seem intent on dehumanizing anyone who doesn’t serve their ends. Unless the Mississippi River is beset by hundreds of barges full of illegal aliens who embarked off New Orleans, it’s not obvious why ICE operates a detention facility in rural Missouri anyway, but I digress. I remain much more sympathetic to anti-Islamic i...

 If anyone deserves to die, it’s this guy. A US Army officer, he started shooting, killing 13 people and injuring 32 others. And it’s terrorism. He probably became persuaded of the eventual conquest of the decadent “Great Satan.” Whatever. By the way, I don’t care if there happened to be a mosque in my neighborhood. We’re the land of the free, and the home of the brave, not the home of the paranoid. More than likely, someone first got here from the Middle East or Iran or even Africa to get away from the “Islamic” terrorists. If someone accepts our pluralistic society in general and dare I say liberal values—with apologies to Patrick Deneen and Bryan Cross—it’s not my concern. I’m more worried about progressives not accepting our way of life than Muslims, to be frank with you. You know, I am not really worried about dating myself, but I get curious about what people are saying. I started following this cute girl (woman) because she said she was a matchmaker. About 2 weeks later, I f...

 I went to a trivia night several years ago to benefit L’Arche. In St. Louis, MO, you can raise money for almost anything with a trivia night. It’s just really big in my hometown, for some reason. We’re just smart, and we like eating, drinking, and helping people. I think I just described every Catholic town on Earth. Anyway, I have become pretty aware that I arouse pity just by being out in the world. That’s life with all the visible or audible disabilities, I guess. I myself have no cognitive impairments whatsoever, and I’m happy with that. If I am honest, though, God has deserved more thanks for that than I have given so far. My intellect isn’t mine, any more than Kelsey Mitchell or Caitlin Clark or Roger Federer can take credit (entirely) for their athletic ability. Then again, a defect you carry from the beginning, the opposite of which you have never experienced, carries less sorrow than losing the ability to do something you did before. (I’m losing some of those things, and ...

 On the one hand, I served and learned alongside women as a Presbyterian in seminary (PCA). I'm highly in favor of them getting any advanced degree a man could get. I personally don't really mind them going to more "liberal" denominations to hold pastoral offices, because the taxonomy from the Anglican bishop J.B. Lightfoot within the essay "On The Christian Ministry" highlights both Protestantism's fatal flaw, and illustrates why female clergy really can only occur in a Protestant context. Many Anglicans are angered at being called "Protestant," but they'll finally get over it when they re-join the one true Church. Lightfoot said that the conception of the pastoral office is either "sacerdotal" (from the Latin for "priest") or "functional." Very low church Protestants and independent communities that emerged in the aftermath of the Reformation tend--if this is a spectrum--toward the functional end, while commu...

 She’s Christa Pike’s victim. You can’t say anything about anything without the madding crowd demanding “balance” on every question. Colleen was a person who didn’t deserve to die. She was loved by people, and first by God. She was murdered by Christa Pike more than 30 years ago. Whatever we decide to do with Pike, she did that. Colleen isn’t coming back here. But if I’m right about God, why would we want her to, on the one hand? On the other, we know from experience that human connection and love is a great solace in this vale of tears. There isn’t enough solace here in human terms, if you’re asking me. But you don’t get life from death. Christ defeated death. He didn’t make it sunshine and rainbows. Ordinarily, death begets more death. More sorrow. More loss. Look me in the face and tell me that you want the government who can’t fix our streets and bridges to be meting out death. Don’t answer me from feelings; we know what those often say. If someone killed one of my brothers or ...

 The Dobbs decision was great. It’s a great day for America, and eventually the world. And it never happens if Secretary Clinton wins the presidency. I come by it honest. If I tell you we’d be better off if Donald J. Trump never becomes our president, I absolutely mean it. But the blood would still cry out from the ground. Ask me why I don’t cheer unequivocally for Democrats, and that’s why. Troubling thing about elected Democrats and far Left activists today: Their moral rigidity would be welcome, but for the fact that they’re wrong about everything of consequence. It’s great we don’t say “faggot” and other slurs in polite society; the bait-and-switch about what families are, and what we ought to do in law and culture remains. When I talk about false sentimentality around gay activism, I mean that deep down, we know—or we ought to—that it’s not cost-free to anyone. It’s not a cutesy Will & Grace episode. And it all leads to the rivers of blood pouring out of the abortuaries. P...

 (Note: The balance of this piece was published as a Facebook status first.) People are free to like what they like, and not like stuff they don’t. And this includes Taylor Swift. Me personally? I love her music. But I have to object personally to the idea that her target audience is women and girls. I’m neither one of those things. And even if it were true, the men I associate with genuinely like and admire women and girls. We should be as offended by the idea that women are odd, or so different than men that never the twain shall meet, as we are that all men are violent monsters. Anyway, I remember hearing Taylor at 16 on the radio giving an interview. Her first song “Tim McGraw” had just come out. The interviewer asked her who she wanted to write songs with. She said Craig Wiseman. That dude has some serious credits to his name, including helping Phil Vassar write his self-titled debut in 2000. And I can remember thinking, “This kid is gonna be huge.” Right now, she’s the bigges...

 Christa Pike was the victim of a botched execution in Tennessee. It’s all the proof we need that we shouldn’t do this anymore. While we’re on the subject, her life is textbook “mitigating factors.” We shouldn’t have even gotten to this point in this case. And she was sentenced 31 years ago. Don’t read the comments. We’re coarsened by our thirst for blood. And don’t argue “limited government” with me; the Supreme Court lifted a stay that the state had granted. The federal government imposed itself to help the state of Tennessee kill Pike, and couldn’t even do it right. Your tax dollars at work. The supreme expression of government power over the individual is in killing. If you want more of it, you might be a lot of things, but you’re not a conservative in the Anglo-American sense. A lot of American Catholics are sold on the “Frank The Hippie Pope” narrative, because it obscures the fact that the popes have been moving toward abolition of capital punishment for 60 years. If you spe...