Tag: reactions

Categories
life

What Kind of God Do You Worship?

I heard this story on NPR this morning about a dozen Catholic women in the US who claim to have been ordained as priests. I am not Catholic, and so it would seem that I have no vested interest in this story. However, this story brings up a question that I have had with a number of movements within a variety of religions in recent history (for example – the schism among the Anglicans over whether to bless gay marriages or ordain openly gay priests). When I hear about these debates among the clergy and the actions of those who proceed to do something that has not been sanctioned – in this case, ordaining women to be priests – I begin to wonder what kind of a God they worship.

In many churches, where decisions of policy are made by a vote, I can understand (to some degree) why people would approach these changes the same way we approach social changes in a democratic society. Ordain a few women priests (or whatever your cause is) to show that the change is not going to make the organization fall apart as a result. In more authoritarian organizations, like the Catholic church, it seems ludicrous to do so. These organizations preach that the doctrines are not made by man and thus cannot be changed by the will of men. Following that doctrinal reasoning, a change must not take place without the direction and sanction of God (however that is perceived to happen within any particular organization). There may be some value in debating an idea, but to take action without sanction in an organization with those beliefs makes no sense. This is what leads me to my question.

If you believe what the Catholic church teaches about being directed by God and about Papal Infallibility then you could not, in good conscience, defy the laws of the Catholic church. If you do not believe those things then you should ask yourself – why do I remain a Catholic?

As far as I can figure, the people who do these things must believe one (or both) of two things.

First, they may believe that the church is a social institution. This would imply that it is organized and run by people who are fallible and that those people make their policies according to their best understanding of what God desires. If this is the case, it would make sense to call to their attention those cases where they have interpreted the will of God erroneously. The question becomes, who is the final judge of which interpretation is correct (yours or the church leaders’).

Second, they may believe in a God who is fallible. This reduces their deity to an extremely powerful man, or possibly some other extra-terrestrial being. In saying this I do not wish to mock anybody’s beliefs on the subject. I am merely outlining where my logic takes me as I try to explain their actions.

If someone believes in an all-powerful, all-knowing God and also believes that their church is directed by that God, then it makes no sense to knowingly disregard the edicts of that church. To do so suggests the desire to say “I have a better understanding/interpretation of what is good than an all-knowing, all-powerful Deity.” Does anyone really want to say that?

Categories
politics

Well Stated

I stumbled onto Peonicus’ View of Politics the same day I started my new blog and I thought it would be a good excuse to post a reaction and test out my blog a little more.

I was amazed to hear criticism for both the left and the right so early in the post. Right off I was saying to myself “my thoughts exactly.”

When I read:

What we need is for the existing society to behave with the primary goal of the good of the whole. This means that we focus less on our personal fortunes, and more on using our influence to do good. We must start at the most fundamental unit of society: our families. First, we need to respect and honor our spouses even more than ourselves. Then we must be loving parents, and teach our children to love and respect others despite inevitable differences.

I recognized some positively primitive thinking – like my own. The answer does not lie in making new laws to govern campaign finance – although those might be helpful. The answer lies in returning to who we are – people who want better lives for ourselves and our children. If that is our primary focus, and if we can remember to “forgive and ask for forgiveness,” we may be able to get past our mudslinging and divisiveness and start to find actual solutions. That makes me begin to wonder, is Peonicus right in suggesting:

What would happen in the Middle East if everybody there, Jews and Muslims alike taught their children that there is no us and them, there is simply us. I think the fighting would end tomorrow, and the poverty of the region could be ended by 2007.

It would be nice if he was, but we’ll never know unless more people think like this.

Categories
National politics State

Back Door Legislation or The Root of Judicial Activism

If there is anyone who still reads this blog they will be well aware that I have been lousy at posting anything in the last month or so. I have been working on various other projects and purposely leaving this site dormant for the present, but I am compelled to post after I heard that the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts is hearing a lawsuit on gay marriage. The court is being used as a vehicle to try to get a 1913 law thrown out which prevents the state from issuing marriage licenses to couples who are not residents of Massachusetts if their marriage would not be recognized in their home states.The argument is that the law is being used to discriminate against gay couples. Unfortunately this is a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. If the law is being used to discriminate against gays then it should be applied equitably rather than being repealed. These plaintiffs need to prove that heterosexual couples who would not be allowed to marry a home are being given marriage licenses in Massachusetts.

It is easy to see that the agenda operating behind this is not deterred by state boundaries. This is nothing more than a step to legalize gay marriage throughout the country. If this suit succeeds there will be couples from around the country who come to Massachusetts to marry and then complain in their home states that they are facing discrimination. Nobody can argue that this is not the case because the plaintiffs include eight out of state couples. This will happen despite the fact that there is already a federal law stating that one state is not obligated to recognize marriages performed in another state.

I will attempt to walk a very fine line here. I do not wish this to be viewed as a homophobic posting. Unfortunately I cannot claim to know and love a large number of gay people (that would strengthen my argument) but I would hope that it can be said that I treat all gay people with whom I come in contact with the same respect that any human being deserves. I might add that this is the same respect which I withold from bigots of every type. I abhor bigotry and hope never to be guilty of it. That being said I want to address this suit in the light of judicial activism.

Suits like this are the very thing that give rise for judges to exercise any pre-disposisiton towards judicial activism. If this suit has merit the proper course of action would be to have the law rewritten or applied fairly. The plaintiffs have expressed their intention – which is to have the law annulled. If they fully win their case activist judges on the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts can use it as an excuse to rule that the law be removed rather than corrected and enforced properly.

Anyone who nievely argues that this case stops at Massachusetts must ask themselves what a gay couple gains by going to Massachusetts to get married if they then return to their home state knowing that their marriage will not be recognized. The answer is that they gain nothing except more leverage in their fight to legalize gay marriage in their home states. This is not the correct way to go about changing the law. If you want a legal gay marriage move somewhere that it is already legal. If you want to legalize gay marriage live within the bounds of the law and push for legislation to make gay marriage legal where you live.

We have an estalished process for the passage of laws. If a majority of people believe in something it will become law. We have checks in place to minimize the chance for majorities to trample the rights of minorities, but the judicial system is to interpret law and not write it through opinion. If the 1913 law should be repealed that should happen through a vote of the legislature or a ballot initiative. Even Gov. Schwarzenegger understood that when he vetoed a bill to legalize same-sex marriage because the people of California had already passed a proposition stating that “only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.” The governor argued rightly that “We cannot have a system where the people vote and the Legislature derails that vote.” It can also be said that we cannot have a system where the people vote and judges derail the vote once it has passed by a super-majority.

Categories
National politics

Nomination and Confirmation

Well, we’ve had the name of John Roberts as the niminee for the opening on the Supreme Court bench for a couple of days now. I have tried to give myself some time to gather some information and draw some conclusions before I posted my thoughts in this nomination. The main questions were: (1)should John Roberts be confirmed? and (2)will John Roberts be confirmed?My personal answers at this time are: (1)I still don’t have enough information to say for sure and (2)probably.

John Roberts has the objective credentials to be a supreme court justice. There are those who might complain about a lack of experience, but really we could do much worse on experience. So far the democratic senators who have spoken up seem to indicate that they will not make this a nasty confirmation. They have both the right and the responsibility to question Judge Roberts thoroughly during the confirmation hearings but it appears that they will not resort to a filibuster which means that he will probably be confirmed.

Now, because of how little I have been able to learn about this man with the thin judicial resume, the question has been raised in my head: is the way to get people appointed to the supreme court in these days of divisive politics to find someone who has a scant record who you hope will do what you want (based on your own ideological leaning) but who has very little for the opposition to oppose? That seems to be the formula here. I do not mean to imply that Judge Roberts is unqualified or even that the president might think him unqualified but dependable. I am saying that one of the reasons that I believe this nomination will succeed, and possibly one of the reasons that it was made, is because the liberals may have their objections and suspicions but they have very little ammunition from Roberts’ short tenure as a federal judge.

Hopefully I have made it clear what I am referring to when I ask: does our political situation dictate that this is how to make things happen? And if so: is it a safe situation to require that a judge have a short track record if he is to survive the confirmation process?

Categories
culture

Bill Gates’ Speech

Thanks to e-Clippings I read the text of Bill Gates’ Speech on America’s failing high schools.

I can’t say that I am the biggest fan of Gates’ products, but his rhetoric here is exactly right and I think everyone should read it.

Categories
culture technology

Unsign Me Up

This Slashdot article asks “Would you be violating a social contract hitting the 30sec skip button on Tivo? Or putting a strip of paper across the bottom of our TV screen to block out those super annoying scrolling banners?”

My question is, if viewing ads and pop-ups is part of my social contract, how can I cancel the contract?

Categories
politics

More Daylight

What difference will more daylight savings make to those of us outside of Arizona? Not much that I can see.

If the politicians want to pass this I don’t mind it. I would love to use more sunlight, but let’s not fool ourselves that this will make a big difference in our oil consumption. If we save 10,000 barrels per day for an extra five weeks out of the year it would take us 57 years to save one day’s worth of oil at 20 million barrels per day (our current usage level) so it will not make us noticably less dependent on the Arabian peninsula.

Categories
technology

Trash IE 6

I just spent 5 hours working on some beautiful, valid CSS because it was not rendering correctly in IE 6. It worked perfectly in Firefox. After all that work I came up with ugly and almost valid CSS that functions in both browsers – because I have to. I’d rather just put: Get Firefox! on the site and tell IE users to trash IE 6.

Categories
life technology

I Need a Grain of Salt

I have seen the list of these advantages to blogging (broken link) but, while I believe that blogging is beneficial to my career, I have a hard time believing all of those benefits without some evidence. Specifically I have some reservations about benefit number 5 and to a lesser extent I question numbers 3 and 10 also.

Categories
National politics

Running mates

While reading Maureen Dowd’s column (The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Are They Losing It? ) I began to think some old thoughts that I believed I had forsaken. When things started getting worse for the Bush administration I briefly flirted with the idea that the president would be best served by getting rid of the vice president and a few of his other hawkish advisors. Eventually I decided that it would be enough to get rid of the others and that the VP could stay. I’m rethinking that position. I would not blame Cheney for all the administrations problems as easily as Ms. Dowd does, but the only benefits that Mr. Cheney brought to the ticket in 2000 no longer apply. He was a face of experience in a rather novice administration. He brought a familiar face for the world, but that was a world at peace where America was fairly well respected. No matter how experienced any memeber of this administration is or isn’t now they will be judged based on the last four years. The world is no longer at peace and America is not nearly so well respected in the world as it was before. Neither of those things is strictly the fault of this administration (circumstances beyond anybody’s control played a part) but the fact is that the problem is worse than it could have been because of some poor advice from Mr. Cheney, among others. I think the best thing for the Bush re-election campaign would be to unload the baggage and start with a fresh VP.

For all the talk of a cross-party Kerry/McCain ticket, I think a Bush/McCain ticket would be a formidable sight next to a Kerry/Anyone Else ticket. John McCain is closer to the center than the president while Dick Cheney is closer to the right than the president. McCain is a known uniter and nobody doubts that he means what he says even if it is not popular. McCain could be a very trustworthy face next to Bush which would be a great step up from the controversy laden Cheney.