Adherents of a religon of peace who paid no attention to that part.
Get ready for an all-out hashtag blitz by Mrs. Obama and other distant observers.
Pope Francis announces a truism
Addressing Vatican diplomats, he said: (http://www.cruxnow.com/church/2015/01/12/pope-francis-warns-anew-of-a-piecemeal-world-war/?s_campaign=crux:email:ja)
Peace, Francis said, is the indispensable condition for making progress on other fronts, such as economic development, care of immigrants, and the environment.
Second only to freedom. When was the last time a Pope pushed freedom as a sine qua non?
Well, he did talk about it, saying this:
“Before all else be free persons!” said the Pope. “Freedom means knowing how to reflect on what we do, knowing how to evaluate . which are the behaviors that make us grow. It means always choosing the good…. Being free to always choose the good is challenging, but it will make you persons with a backbone, who know how to face life, [and live as] courageous and patient persons.”
But I mean political freedom, Popes and Catholic writers and preachers have talked a lot about personal freedom, as from the chains of Satan and the like.
Thing is, he’s gotten very political. So political freedom? I’m listening.
Pope Francis’ to-do list: Ditch the NGO, marketing expert image
The media like, even love, him. Is that a good thing?
Among Pope Francis’ challenges for the new year is changing the media’s perception of him. Currently this perception is undoubtedly positive, as is proven by the many polls conducted by several media outlets that rank him among the most beloved and influential people in the world.
But it is also a perception that carries with it somewhat stereotyped images of Church and pope, as if the Church were an NGO or a corporation with the pope serving as a CEO or as a marketing expert hired to revitalize the Church’s disgraced image.
Yes, yes, the devil can quote Scripture to his purpose, but is there a problem making friends with the mammon of iniquity? We can’t love it and God, that much we know. And Popes can be tempted, like the rest of us.
Rauner’s appointments coming up, “major structural reforms”?
”We have a structural problem decades in the making. Illinois government must undergo major structural reforms and implement honest budget practices that together address the long-term problems of the state,” Nuding said.
His operating officers. Bound to make a big difference, if only (we hope) they are neither hacks nor major campaign donors, the bane of good government everywhere.
The Pope strikes again: Cardinals where you don’t expect to find them
Lest anybody forgot, on announcing his first scarlet batch a year ago this week, the Pope issued a public letter to the cardinals-designate warning them that they were to accept the red hat as “neither an honour nor a decoration,” but “simply a service that requires you to broaden your gaze and open your hearts.” The incoming class was likewise urged to greet their elevations in a manner “far from any expression of worldliness or from any form of celebration contrary to the evangelical spirit of austerity, sobriety and poverty.”“The cardinalate,” Francis said, “does not imply promotion.”
But yr Holiness, but-but-but . . . It’s never been that way!
(I love what he does in ecclesiastical matters, where he knows what he’s talking about.)
No Cupich, no Chaput, no Gomez = no “Americans” this times, sez the Pope
Republicans in state governments plan juggernaut of conservative legislation – The Washington Post
The unprecedented breadth of the Republican majority — the party now controls 31 governorships and 68 of 98 partisan legislative chambers — all but guarantees a new tide of conservative laws. Republicans plan to launch a fresh assault on the Common Core education standards, press abortion regulations, cut personal and corporate income taxes and take up dozens of measures challenging the power of labor unions and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Challenge to the Beltway element in American life.
Look too for increased over-all prosperity in these states and their population growth at expense of other states.
Happy New Year
“Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”
— Benjamin Franklin
(1706-1790) US Founding Father
“Alcohol didn’t cause the high crime rates of the ‘20s and ‘30s, Prohibition did. And drugs do not cause today’s alarming crime rates, but drug prohibition does…. Trying to wage war on 23 million Americans who are obviously very committed to certain recreational activities is not going to be any more successful than Prohibition was.”
— Judge James Paine
U.S. District Court
Source: address to the Florida Bar Association in Miami, November, 1991
“Nothing so needs reforming as other people’s habits.”
— Mark Twain
[Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835-1910)
Italian writer stirs a hornet’s nest with doubts about Pope Francis | Crux
Commenter on John Allen’s as usual excellent discussion/reportage about the Pope as sending mixed signals in multiple statements and comments has a good, if of limited value, point:
•
I guess one question surfaces…are these contradictions deliberate or a mere result of Francis’s mercurial way of communicating, perhaps owing to his personality or cultural upbringing.
If deliberate…he will fail hard. Crafty popes God doesn’t need.
If owing to mere quirkiness, he may fail; or he may have limited success, but more likely his pontificate will be somewhat a disappointing custodial one.
If this is overly pessimistic or not, the cultural upbringing factor leaps out. It’s in his genes to talk that way, which is in part charming, in part annoying when you consider his position on the ship of Peter.
Something else: He seems sometimes to be running for president of the united states of the world rather than already elected to a quite different job.
Jeb Bush Faces a Catholic Question in 2016
A new poll shows the former governor of Florida — brother of President Bush 43 and son of President Bush 41 — leading the field of potential 2016 Republican presidential candidates. The poll comes just as Pope Francis is moving assertively, and some might say clumsily, on the public policy front, inspiring the deal between Havana and Washington to renew full diplomatic relations and preparing a papal encyclical on climate change.
Story is about the Pope’s taking positions right and left (or just left, suit yourself) and putting it to Catholic candidates, such as Jeb Bush.
And "clumsily" as to the Pope’s jumping into things seems about right. He’s the quickest draw in the west, this Francis, going too often where angels fear to tread.
