Hedonism, an ancient heresy...

As I was reading through Saint Augustine's 5th century masterpiece, "City of God" and came across wonderful picture of hedonism and was taken aback by its' timeliness.

"Those philosophers who regard virtue as the ultimate human good try to make those others feel ashamed of themselves who think highly enough of the virtues, but subordinate them to physical pleasure, making pleasure an end to itself and virtues merely a means to this end. They do this by picturing Pleasure enthroned like a high-born queen, surrounded by ministering virtues who watch her every nod, ready to do what ever she bids....

Thus the virtues with all the glory of their dignity are made to minister to Pleasure, like the servants of an imperious, but ill-famed mistress."

Ah ha, I thought! This is Hedonism and it is apropos, I think, to call it an ancient (and ever modern) heresy. In fact, the Supreme Court of the United States still makes laws based on the hedonist world view. By the way, I intend to use the word MAKES since, it is, De Facto, what the Supreme Court does. On a side note, I do share the concern of Hamilton's interlocutor in Federal Paper # 78. As evidence of judicial, hedonistic activism, witness this peculiar passage from the Supreme Court case "Casey v. Planned Parenthood".

"At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State."

To borrow a colloquialism from modern American parlance....WTF? ! Talk about defining the meaning out of meaning!!!

Merits & Demerits of Islam, a debate

Here is a video of Robert Spencer and Peter Kreeft, in discussion concerning various elements of Islam. I found the debate very thought provoking.

Kipling's timeless poem

Everyone must read this poem by Rudyard Kipling! The poem is brilliant and timeless. History is just, it seems, a continuing revenge of natural law or COMMON SENSE!

Who is Barak Obama?

I know this is not news to most pro-life Americans but I think it bears regular repetition. The current Presidente of the United States, Barak Obama is adamantly pro-infanticide.

On March 30, 2001, Obama was the only Illinois senator who rose to speak against a bill that would have protected babies who survived late term labor-induced abortion. Obama rose to object that if the bill passed, and a nine-month-old fetus survived a late-term labor-induced abortion was deemed to be a person who had a right to live, then the law would "forbid abortions to take place." Obama further explained the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not allow somebody to kill a child, so if the law deemed a child who survived a late-term labor-induced abortion had a right to live, "then this would be an anti-abortion statute."

Source: Obama Nation, by Jerome Corsi, p.238 Aug 1, 2008

"...endowed by their Creator..."

The President of the United States has recently quoted the Declaration of Independence, directly or indirectly, in three recent speeches. Or, perhaps, I should say MISQUOTES it. He suspiciously leaves out the phrase "endowed by their Creator". For those who do not follow either of the hyperlinks to the Declaration or Presidente Obama's speech should know that the text says,

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

This clearly is not accidental, as he has done it now three times. Anyone who knows anything about the history of religious liberty in the western world, upon reading the above statement, should be struck by the near meaninglessness of the statement without the words in question ("endowed by their Creator"). If the Creator (whether Yahweh, Allah, Zeus, the Great Spirit, or a higher consciousness) did not endow humans with rights then from whence do they come? For example, if the right to life does is not intrinsic, several questions are raised.

1) Where do these rights come from?
2) Are there limits to these rights?
3) Who determines whom gets these rights?

The bottom line is that if the right to life is not universal then it can be taken away by others. Hitler and Stalin did not appear to believe that Jews, "Homosexuals", and others had this intrinsic value. This may have been because they did not believe in a higher authority. In Stalin's case we are sure of this. It stands to reason that if Mr. Stalin could not believe that a higher power existed, he could not have believed that it had endowed his political enemies with rights. By the way, this does not mean that Theists do not commit human rights violation. They, in fact, do. However, this is in contradistinction to their stated beliefs.

I am not suggesting that one must be a Theist to believe in natural law. One, simply, need see two facts.
First, the political, religious, and social freedoms of the western world depend on this implicit acceptance of natural law, endowed by a higher authority. Second, as G.K. Chesterton wrote, that if God is removed from society then the government will attempt to become the god. Negligence of Natural Law is the canary in the coal mine. If a higher authority is removed, humans try to take its place and history tells us that consequences are often horrendous.

Please Mr. President, the USA has fought too long and too hard to reach this point of balance between individual rights and responsibilities. Besides, to misquote the Declaration of Independence, is simply irresponsible history.

Muslims using Good Cop/Bad Cop tool

There is a link that shows how Muslim Activists use the Good Cop/Bad Cop threat to advance their agenda. As a former Muslim, I truly empathize with Muslims who would like Islam to be more peaceful. I had hoped for the same thing. I suggest that Muslims who want Islam to be peaceful should work with the west and "out" the radicals, instead of subtly threatening western, non-Muslims.

Baby Monkey riding on a Pig