The real assault on the Constitution

Forget Obama's pen. The real problem are the thousands of regulations created by unelected civil servants with job security.

The HHS mandate that tries to force Catholics and Evangelicals to pay for abortion inducing chemicals was made by unelected civil servants who cannot be thrown out of office. They can create what are effectively laws while being paid by taxpayers while taxpayers have to spend a fortune and deal with years long legal battles to preserve the freedoms those civil servants are trying to destroy.

That asymmetry means the citizens lose and the governments power grows irrespective of who is elected.

Oklahoma city vs NY; what a difference

Liberals, lead by Bill Clinton, blames Rush Limbaugh for the Oklahoma city bombing of a Federal building because Rush criticized the government.

Rush never ever called for violence and never incited others to call for violence nor did he support those who did call for violence.

Yet the liberals and the media condemned him.

Similarly liberals blamed Sarah Palin for the shooting of Rep. Giffords even though it was shown that the killer was a nut case who was never shown to even know who Palin was.

But now we're told that even though liberals encouraged protesters who were calling for dead cops those liberals have no responsibility for the execution of two police officers who dedicated their lives to helping others.

Liberals also fail to note that both of the slain officers were minorities yet supposedly the problem with the police is that they are racists.

Liberals never ever take responsibility for their actions so we shouldn't be surprised.  But the simple truth is that while liberals like Sharpton and de Blasio didn't want to kill cops their actions inspired the man who did kill the officers.  There may not be blood on liberals hands but liberals are responsible for creating the atmosphere that encouraged the killer to use violence.

Why it's clear Black lives really don't matter to liberals.

check out my article on American Thinker

Prayer request

My mother in law passed away today. Please pray for her and her family. Thanks!

The real torture scandal in America

See my article at American Thinker

What the Pope really said on evolution and the Big Bang

Many in the media are trying to paint the Pope as the new Martin Luther changing Catholic doctrine about evolution and the Big Bang in order to transform the Catholic Church into a more liberal version of the Unitarians.

The reality is quite different; the Pope can’t change defined doctrine and the Church doesn’t have an official position on matters of science.

To help folks who aren’t familiar with the Church’s view of the world understand what Pope Francis really said let’s take a look at how the Church views theology and science.

Back in the 4^th century St. Augustine pointed out a key thing about the Bible; it’s not designed to teach us how nature works.

Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he hold to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason? -- De Genesi ad litteram libri duodecim ("The Literal Meaning of Genesis")

The Church has always taught that the Bible is about how to live.  Hence scientific items in the Bible not relevant to the faith are to be subjected to scientific not theological analysis. 

For example if God used evolution to form the human body, as He used gravity to form the Earth, instead of just creating it directly how would that affect how we serve Christ? The answer of course is it wouldn’t.

The point then is that the Church views Scripture as being about how we are to live, what it means to be good, how we are to serve God not about scientific principles.

Here’s Pope Francis on evolution:

When we read in Genesis the account of Creation, we risk imagining that God was a magician, with such a magic wand as to be able to do everything. However, it was not like that. He created beings and left them to develop according to the internal laws that He gave each one, so that they would develop, and reach their fullness. He gave autonomy to the beings of the universe at the same time that He assured them of his continual presence, giving being to every reality.

God created everything but He creates things that change according to the laws He has defined; evolution is a tool defined by God with the intent of producing the human body.  God did create Adam from the earth—for eventually all of our molecules trace back to the earth—but He may have used a longer term process rather than a sudden one.

Effectively the Church gives to science what is science’s—how the body came about—and gives to God what is God’s—that God creates each human soul and that God created the universe and the laws that it runs by. 

Because the Church does not take positions on scientific principles a Catholic can believe in evolution or deny it but he can’t say that the Bible prevents it from having happened.

This is nothing new in 1950 Pope Pius XII wrote

…the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter - for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God.

If science were to suddenly change its mind about evolution the Church would not care because once we accept that man is body and soul how God produced the body has no impact on how we are to serve Christ.

The Popes comments on the Big Bang are similarly conservative:

The Big-Bang, that is placed today at the origin of the world, does not contradict the divine intervention but exacts it.

Few realize that the concept of the Big Bang was developed by a Catholic priest, Msgr. Georges Lemaître.

Fewer still know that the Big Bang theory was fought tooth and nail by some atheist scientists, such as Fred Hoyle, because the Big Bang theory is a strong argument for the existence of God.  Hoyle only gave up when the evidence for the Big Bang became undeniable.

Modern physics tells us that energy is conserved so that something cannot come from nothing hence if all there is is the universe it can’t self create without breaking the laws of physics. 

While some scientists, such as Hawkings, spin fables about how future science might be able to explain how the universe came out of nothing they have no real theories nor any experimental evidence to show that the thoroughly validated laws of conservation of energy and causality are wrong; but if those laws are right then the universe can’t exist without God.

God solves the problem of something from nothing because God, being spirit not matter, is not subject to the laws He made.

The key point to realize is that the Big Bang is, as Pope Francis said, a strong sign of God’s existence and hence fully consistent with Catholic theology.

After all what better description of the first instants of the Big Bang is there than “Let there be light”?

It’s important not to lump the Catholic Church in with certain Christian groups that believe everything in the Bible is literally true when contemplating what the Pope is actually saying.

Next time you see the media trumpeting the Pope making some massive change in Catholic doctrine remember that the Church moves slowly and even the Pope can’t change what has been dogmatically defined in the past.  He can present a more refined view of doctrine or he can define the Church position on an issue that had not been previously officially defined but he can’t overrule what the Church has already held to be dogmatically true. 

Feel free to follow tom on Twitter

Turning Muslim against Muslim to win the war on terror

If you think that every Muslim is a monster don't bother to read the article. You won't like it.
Da Article

You'd think letting them get the A-Bomb would have put Obama on Iran's good side but no...

Obama has been working hard to avoid actually limiting Iran's ability to make nuclear weapons while simultaneously ensuring that the devastating impact of the previous trade embargoes is relaxed.

The Supreme Leader in Iran needed that help. The natives were getting restless because the fanaticism of the "religious" leadership was making life for the average Iranian miserable.  Especially when they saw all the money they were shipping off to various terrorist groups.

And Obama, who for some reason was silent during the crushed Arab Spring moment in Iran, came through for the mullah's.

You'd think that that would buy Obama at least a symbolic agreement from Iran to work together against ISIL a group that wants to kill all Shia Muslims-- and of course the Supreme Leader and Iranians in general are Shia.

But no that's not how it worked out.

I guess appeasement doesn't buy you what it used to; at least Chamberlin got a piece of paper.

Christ the King from Mission Carmel Catholic church

Monterey Bay Aquarium

Perpetual Adoration at Our Lady of Peace Catholic church

Is anything Obama does working? Amazingly yes.

Ukraine is being partitioned by Russia because Putin knows Obama is weak--that works for Obama because it keeps unemployment and poverty out of the news.

ISIL is murdering Christians because Obama wouldn't support the moderate Syrian rebels two years ago.

More and more people are losing their health insurance and having to pay much higher rates due to Obamacare.

Real unemployment is staggeringly high due to Obama's economic policies.

Welfare spending is out of control--that's working for Obama because people who think their next meal depends on liberals running Washington is what Obama wants.

Wages are depressed by illegals--that's working for Obama since his big business supporters want cheap labor.

Foreign leaders neither trust nor respect Obama--that's working for Obama since that means he doesn't have to deal with them.

The IRS is an arm of the Democrat party--that's working for Obama.

The VA is a shambles.

Obama's speech: What can I do to look tough without doing anything?

A key point of Obama's speech appeared to be telling the world that the "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" is not Islamic.  It's one thing to say they are the Westboro Baptists of Christianity--which still slanders the peaceful folks in Westboro-- but Obama instead said ISIL has nothing to do with Islam.

With that out of the way Obama sketched out a plan where unnamed Arab/Muslim countries would do the heavy lifting in crushing ISIL while the US provides weapons and air strikes.

For a man who condemned George Bush's coalition to liberate Iraq Obama seemed awfully reluctant to even name who is in his coalition.

Obama also didn't explain how ISIL went from being the JVs to a world threat under his watch.

Do you remember how Obama and the Democrats condemned Bush when Bush said "Mission Accomplished"?  Yet Obama told us that we'd won the war in Iraq and that everything was so cool we could leave without a trace and Iraq would be fine.  How is that different than what Bush did? Oh yeah it's different because when Bush realized the Iraqies couldn't handle a jump into the deep end of the pool of freedom he kept the US involved while Obama just said sayonara and patted himself on the back.

Arab leaders don't trust Obama and rightly so.  Obama promised military action against Syria if the Syrian regime used chemical weapons. Syria then used chemical weapons against civilians and Obama backed down.  We now know that Syria has been using poison gas against its people even after all Syria's chemical weapons were supposedly destroyed and yet Obama says nothing. With that sort of track record who in their right mind would trust Obama?

Yet to build a coalition you need the trust of the coalition members.

Essentially Obama's "strategy" hinges on American credibility that he has destroyed.

For the sake of those being slaughtered by ISIL we can only hope that somehow Obama's weakness and  perceived fondness for radical Islam--he backed the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt for example and said nothing to support the Arab Spring movement in Iran-- will be overlooked by the countries--which ever ones they may be--that are to be in Obama's grand new coalition.

Clearly the best option at this point is to pray hard for the victims of ISIL because trusting in the self anointed messiah Obama is not a credible option. All things are possible with God; even the US crushing ISIL with Obama at the helm.

How dumb are you?

Obama is betting you're really dumb.

He's illegally put off implementing the really bad parts of Obamacare until after the fall election; the parts that will cause millions of people with health insurance through their jobs to lose that insurance.

If you don't believe me ask yourself this; why did Obama lie to you for years about you being able to keep your insurance if you like it?

Now Obama has admitted he's effectively going to not only legalize millions of illegals who are already in the country but he's going to legalize anyone who can sneak across the border so long as he's president.

He's even told us that he's going to do that right after the election.

He thinks we're really stupid.

Don't prove him right donate to, work for, and vote for conservative candidates especially in the senate.

If Republicans get control of the senate they can keep Obama from packing the courts with judges who ignore the Constitution, they can show the country that Obama is the problem by sending him laws he will constantly veto, they can force investigations into the massive corruption in the Obama regime, they can reign in the IRS, they can fix the health care problems without having IRS bureaucrats controlling our medical decisions, and they can stop Obama's persecution of people of faith.

Every election is important but unless you want the economy to keep tanking, illegals to be welcomed, and religion to be persecuted it's critical that Republicans--for all their faults--win the senate.

We had an exhibit at our church, Our Lady of Peace Catholic church, consisting of statues and images of the Blessed Virgin Mary from around the world.

You can see all the images here

Thoughts on the evils of suicide

Our natural response to suicide is to feel sorry for the person who was so tormented that they chose to take their own life.

That compassion is good because it reflects the love Christ said we should have for our neighbors.  Someone who kills themselves is no less deserving of our love than they were before they made that horrible decision.

However there is a risk of encouraging more suicides if we lose track of the bad aspects of suicide.

From a theological sense it's a sin though clearly many, if not nearly all, people who commit suicide are not mentally competent and hence not capable of sinning. In any case it is for God to judge not us and we can only pray that His infinite Mercy will bring the troubled soul to Him for eternal rest.

But even from a purely secular perspective suicide hurts people.

The person who kills themselves leaves their family and friends with a huge amount of trauma. They also leave whatever problems were bothered by for someone else to deal with.

Once again if the person who kills themselves is not mentally competent, which is often the case, they aren't responsible for the havoc their action causes.  The purpose of pointing this out is not to condemn those poor people who kill themselves but to deter those who would follow in their footsteps.

These are hard words but they are needed for those who are contemplating suicide and who are mentally competent.  In our world it's easy for people to think that suicide is ok, even to think that others would be better of if we were dead.  Yet that's not true.

God has a plan and it doesn't involve killing ourselves.  When we go against His will we cause pain and suffering. That's inevitable since His will is motivated by unlimited love for us.

When we think there is no other option we need to seek help and seek out others; we are not islands.

Anyone who is contemplating suicide needs to think about others not themselves. That will not only spare families and friends from suffering but  it will spare the person themselves by giving them a chance to overcome the sorrows that are driving them to contemplate suicide.

Lawless liberals and their drive for tyranny

When a judge rules that a law defining marriage as being between a man and woman is "unConstitutional" we see gays getting married immediately but when a 3 judge panel rules that Obamacare subsidies can't be paid to exchanges not run by the state Obama says he'll keep making the payments.

Liberals really don't think the laws apply to them.  And when the man in the White House thinks he's above the law--that he shouldn't have to deal with Congress to get things done-- you have tyranny.

Liberal "science" for non-scientists; why Neil deGrasse Tyson is wrong

I was recently asked by some atheists to watch a video of Neil deGrasse Tyson where he supposedly explained why there is no God because the universe isn't well designed.

The first thing to note is that while Neil has a great science education he apparently knows little or nothing about theology, specifically Christian theology.  

From the Christian perspective God did create a perfect universe but then when Adam and Eve sinned they shattered the perfection of the universe. In Eden the lion didn't eat the lamb, no one got sick, etc but when man sinned that changed.  Hence even if one could find "bad design" in the universe it wouldn't say anything about God.  

But even ignoring that Neil said a lot of things that are logically wrong.

The first point he made, as I recall, was that the universe was too big. Why make such a huge place just for people on Earth?

The first, and most obvious, objection is that Neil is an astrophysicist. He so loves studying this vast universe that, when not attacking Christianity, he dedicates his life to researching it.  Given that creating the universe is trivial for God it would seem obvious that God may have created this huge universe simply to provide amusement for people like Neil; sort of like the mobiles parents put over their babies cribs.

The next objection is that Neil has no idea how many worlds full of people with souls there are in the universe so he really can't say that the "huge" universe is wasted.

Neil also mentioned that supernova's were a sign of bad design because when they blow up they kill life over a huge region of space.  That sounds bad except that if the only place in the universe that matters is Earth--critical for Neil's argument that the universe is too big--unless a supernova wipes out life on Earth supernova's explosive tendencies are only good not bad.

Why good? Well it turns out that all of the heavy elements, pretty much everything beyond oxygen, in the universe are created in supernova's.  Without supernova's there'd be nothing to make a world like Earth out of; no iron, no lead etc.

According to Neil then the fact that there are supernova's that make life possible is a sign of bad design.  Right.

Neil made a bunch of other equally illogical and baseless points which I don't happen to recall, and I'm not wasting another 5 minutes of my life on his "reasoning", all of which are based on a singularly large case of conceit on Neil's part; that if something doesn't make sense to Neil then it can't be right.

Essentially what Neil is saying is that he is smarter and better informed that an all knowing all powerful God. If Neil didn't claim that then he couldn't say that what he considers poor design is evidence against God.  After all if we could prove that God exists and we still see those examples of "poor" design it would simply mean we don't understand things as well as God does.

Similarly if we see something Neil considers "poor" design it could mean there is no designer, no God, or that we just don't appreciate how wonderful that "poor" design really is.

Neil is a great example of how scientists who don't understand philosophy, religion, or the basic tenants of science--if you can't experiment on it theories are mostly guesses-- are more than glad to politicize "science" to serve modern liberalism.

Sea otters relaxing

From Mission Carmel Catholic church

From Mission Carmel Catholic church

Immigration; love vs responsibility

I think most conservatives would love to give the illegals swarming our borders a chance to succeed in America. After all most conservatives are Christians who view those poor children as their brothers and sisters in Christ.

The problem is that immigration is not what it used to be.

Back 100 or more years when most Americans ancestors came over a new immigrant imposed no burden on his neighbors. If he couldn't cut it he depended on the voluntary contributions of others.  No one held a gun to peoples heads and said "Either help this immigrant live a good life or go to jail".

Today however with the massive welfare state illegals who are supported in a wide variety of ways without paying the full tax burden that Americans are saddled with do damage honest people.

Further America can't support every single poor person, or even every single poor child, in the world. Why are those who live within walking distance of the US specially blessed when it comes to being supported by the US taxpayers? Sounds racist to me.

I realize that some illegal supporters argue that the US South West really belongs to Mexico which is kinda odd. It was Spaniards who conquered that territory, the same Spaniards that those illegal supports condemn as foreign oppressors.  So why are "native" Mexicans entitled to land conquered by the "evil" Spaniards?

The problem then is balancing the needs of the illegals with the rights of Americans.

Clearly if illegals are fleeing genocide--say Jews in WWII-- or mass starvation America has more of an obligation to them than if they are simply trying to get a better lifestyle.  In the former case we really can't turn them away without serious cause while in the latter case they are really no different than thieves.  After all honest people from Central America spend years waiting to get into America legally. If those folks can wait why can't the illegals?

Keep in mind that Blacks stuck in the liberal run hell holes of our inner cities are probably at as much if not more risk than the children fleeing "violence" in central America so it's unclear we should divert money from trying to make Detroit safe in order to let kids from Guatemala be safer. Or maybe we should work with the Guatemalan government to make Guatemala safer for all Guatemalans rather than just trying to rescue a few who can sneak up to the US?

One obvious solution is to provide a way for immigrants to come in without leeching off the government. However even then with Black unemployment running at >11% is it being truly charitable to let in lots of low skill illegals so they can compete with Blacks for jobs?

It would seem that the liberal position is a racist one; Blacks won't take the jobs illegals will, Blacks would rather live off their neighbors than work. Conservatives don't buy that. We know that Blacks are just as hard working and dedicated as Whites when given the chance just as we know that if we cleaned up the liberal teacher union run inner city schools Blacks would do as well in school as Whites.

Given that the Obama economy is a total disaster with unemployment only going down as more people give up hope and either retire early or go on welfare is it truly charitable to let in millions of unskilled workers when we know that will reduce wages and job opportunities for folks who are in America legally?

We need to deal realistically with immigration using both compassion and a sense of responsibility for the Americans who will be impacted by allowing millions of people to become citizens.

The answers may not be obvious but we won't achieve success by demonizing anyone who says that not everyone in the Southern Hemisphere is an American.

The truth about gay's as parents

If you've heard about a study that supposedly shows gay couples are better parents than the evolutionarily normal husband and wife read my article on American Thinker for the "rest of the story".

http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/07/are_children_of_gays_better_off.html

The New King George on American Thinker

How liberals are destroying freedom in America.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/07/the_new_king_george.html

Forget religion; Hobby Lobby is about freedom

The Hobby Lobby decision is about more than religion; it’s about the rights of Americans to not be forced by their government to do what they think is gravely immoral.

If the government can force people who believe, for whatever reason, that abortion is the murder of a human being to directly cooperate, through funding and providing links to the abortion services on their company health insurance web site, in that murder there is really no limit to what the government can do.

While in the Hobby Lobby case the issue is health insurance the real core of the liberal judges conclusions on governmental power is more far reaching. 

There is no guarantee of health insurance in the Constitution.  The Hobby Lobby case is therefore not based on competing Constitutional rights. Instead it’s really simply a measure of how limited, or unlimited, the Governments power to force people to give up their First Amendment rights is.

No one has died from being chaste. We know this because millions of ugly nerdy people go without sex even though they don’t want to and millions more people stay chaste because they believe that sex outside of marriage is morally wrong.

Hence birth control is like sunscreen. Both are health related—though unlike sunscreen the Pill is a carcinogen-- but neither is “necessary” in the sense that an antibiotic is necessary.

As such the liberal judges ruling that free birth control is sufficient reason to compel people to go against their deeply held moral beliefs is an amazingly chilling statement.

If the Government can compel people to violate their deeply held moral principles in order to provide someone else free of charge with a luxury then what rights do Americans have?

We see the same “logic” at work when bakers and photographers are compelled to provide services to gay “weddings”. The “right” of gays to have the photographer or baker they want—for there is no shortage of bakers and photographers who will work at gay “weddings”—has been ruled by the courts to override the deeply held moral beliefs of those photographers and bakers.

What this tells us is that in the mind of liberals if liberals should decide that the Nazi’s are nice folk then it would be ok for the Government to force a Jewish baker to cater a Nazi celebration.

But if the Government has the power to force us to do whatever the Government thinks is good how is that different from a tyranny?

Interestingly enough this tension between the Governments power and people rights has been addressed before in America.  Even when faced with an existential crisis America decided that those whose deeply held moral beliefs prevented them from killing, even in defense of their country, would not be required to fight.

To this day liberals will defend, and even extoll, conscientious objectors.

Yet those same liberals believe that while someone can’t be compelled to kill Nazi’s to save the country she can be compelled to help kill the unborn.

The only logic seems to be that liberals believe that Americans cannot be compelled to do what liberals don’t like but Americans can be compelled to do what liberals do like.

And in a society where the Government can use all of its terrible force to make people do what the Government thinks is good there is no real freedom.

The liberal judges dissent on Hobby Lobby and the cries of anguish from liberals combined with their eager crushing of the rights of those who don’t wish to support so called gay “weddings” reveals the hard fist of dictatorial oppression at the heart of modern liberalism.

Conservatives are not at war with people of good intent—though most people who vote for liberals are ignorant of what they are really voting for—but with the intellectual children of Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot.

The way to win that war is to educate America.  Liberals win because they lie about what they want. They don’t discuss what the Hobby Lobby case is really about for example but instead imply that somehow the Supreme Court has outlawed birth control.

The MSM can be counted on to lie in order to cover the liberal agenda.

That leaves us to bring the truth to our well meaning and good-hearted neighbors.

feel free to follow tom on Twitter

Thanks be to God the First Amendment still stands!

The Supreme Court did not overthrow the First Amendment and has ruled that Christians, at least in the case of closely held corporations, can practice their faiths.

Sadly 4 justices thought that people of faith have no rights that cannot be trampled on by the power of government.

Main altar at Mission San Jose in Fremont CA

The Signal: Fantastic new news source

The Signal

I've been sick. Expect new content within a week.

Nasty bug went from viral to bacterial.  sigh.  The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away Blessed be the Lord!

Liberals on the economy

According to liberals when the government takes money from people who earn it the Government is growing the economy.

According to liberals no matter how little people get for their efforts they will work just as hard and create just as much wealth unless they are minimum skill people who must be paid more in order to work.

According to liberals it's greedy to want to keep the money you earn but it's not greedy to want to take other peoples hard earned money so you can spend it the way want--Thomas Sowell

According to liberals it doesn't matter how many people are on welfare.

According to liberals spending money to prop up an industry that couldn't survive on it's own is a good use of money.

According to liberals people who give up looking for work but who could work are not unemployed.

According to liberals under a Republican President temporary 5% unemployment is a disgrace but under a Democrat President years long 7% unemployment is a sign of compassion.

According to liberals when the number of poor decrease it just means we're not doing enough but when the number of poor increase under a Democrat President it means nothing.

According to liberals government regulations have no impact on productivity.

According to liberals government can "manage" the economy better than the people doing all the work.

According to liberals crony capitalism is great for Democrats but evil for Republicans--well at least they're half right on this one.

According to liberals it's bad if the rich get richer even if the poor get richer too but not as much.

According to liberals it's ok for government to get more and more of everything but bad for people who actually generate wealth to get more and more.