The Gates Of Hell Shall Not Prevail

By REY FLORES

“And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” — Matt. 16:18
You better believe it. Jesus was not kidding or playing around when He said this to Peter, so let’s take solace in this before continuing our column here.
Perhaps the gates of Hell shall not prevail against her, but Hell sure is trying to do everything in its power to hurt as many within the Church as possible.
Case in point. In 2015, the Pew Research Center (which in my opinion is more dedicated to swaying opinions than actually collecting and sharing truthful information), released the results of one of their surveys about Catholics in America in anticipation of last year’s papal visit to our nation.
Pew “reported” all sorts of depressing statistics and information about how Catholics are leaving the Church in droves and how the few of us who are left are contracepting ourselves into obsolescence. Except of course those of us who will remain will be getting married to people of our same gender . . . by priestesses no less, as the Church conforms to the dark lord of this world.
While the Pew survey didn’t actually say it in these exact words, they might as well have. In the overview they write “This may be in part because Francis’ American flock is experiencing life in all its modern complexity.” … Continue Reading

If He Were A Radical Islamist . . . Think Of What The Media Would Allow Trump To Get Away With

By DEXTER DUGGAN

He enslaves women, hates foreigners, and despises other religions. Who is he?
If the answer is Donald Trump, those offensive acts mean he doesn’t agree with Hillary Clinton’s love of ravenous abortion, he thinks un-vetted travelers from the Mideast should be screened before entering the United States, and he knows that Islamic radicals are dangerous.
Trump’s guilt for having such thoughts makes him totally unqualified to run for any office, much less the presidency, say the elite arbiters of correctness.
However, if his name were Donaldrahni Muhammed al-Trumpani, he might keep women chained at home and wearing shroud-like outfits, he’d capture travelers to behead them, and set off bomb blasts in “infidel” areas.
This would seem to be the exact opposite of the world that elite secular arbiters want, a direct threat to all they desire and admire. However, they actually make excuses for, avert their eyes from, and carefully ignore all the offenses that an al-Trumpani would relish.
What is intolerable to them among conservative Americans is accepted willingly by them if it’s far more extreme and done by Mideast anti-“Crusader” zealots. … Continue Reading

The West Is Its Past

By JUDE DOUGHERTY

The West is its Past. The same is true for Islam. Though we may be knowledgeable about the past, what the future portends is impossible to ascertain. History has no predictive value. For one thing, the historian does not spend time formulating historical laws. For the most part he concentrates on telling his story. The historian of political philosophy may be an exception. He may try to show connections between philosophies and movements that he believes are connected, but this does not amount to the formulation of laws.
Some law-like statements can be made if one examines the history of philosophy, but they have little predictive value. If one embraces an empiricist outlook in the beginning, it is certain he will never develop a philosophy of being. But one cannot say with confidence where empiricism will lead — perhaps to Kant, to Wittgenstein, or to Russell or to Ryle, or to the neurobiologist Graziano.
In general, ideas do not follow a set course. There is no law that might enable us to predict the future of Europe as it now confronts a militant Islam. … Continue Reading

Guilt By Association

By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK

There was a time when serious students in college or high school would be familiar with the terms “arguing ad hominem” and the “post hoc ergo propter hoc” fallacy. I don’t know why our schools no longer introduce our young people to these errors in logic. Perhaps it is because they are in Latin and are thought to be outdated for that reason. Or it could be that our educators have concluded that these concepts can be taught without using the Latin terminology.

There is something to the latter proposition. Informed younger Americans are aware that it is a mistake to conclude that an argument is erroneous simply because the person advancing it is a villain or a fool, even if they have never heard the term ad hominem (“to the man”). They know, for example, that you cannot discredit vegetarians simply by pointing to stories about Hitler’s aversion to eating meat.
They also know that because B follows A, it does not necessarily mean that A caused B: correlation does not prove causation. Arguing post hoc ergo propter hoc (“after this, therefore because of this”) does not close the case. If you passed your physics examination the day that you wore red socks, it does not mean the socks had anything to do with your success. Studying hard the night before, on the other hand, probably did make a difference. … Continue Reading

A Bizarre Papal Move

By ROBERT ROYAL

(Wanderer Editor’s Note: Robert Royal is editor-in-chief of The Catholic Thing, which featured this column on September 14. It is reprinted here with permission. All rights reserved.
(This letter from Pope Francis concerning Communion for divorced-remarried Catholics has received widespread comment in Catholic media.
(We direct our readers to Dr. Edward Peters’ blog (canonlawblog.wordpress.com) for September 13 in which he writes, in part: “As hard as it might be to follow, my basic advice to ministers of holy Communion in the context of divorced-and-remarried Catholics is to ignore the coming furor over the Pope’s endorsement of an ambiguously worded document from some local bishops, and just follow the law of the Church, which is quite clear, unless and until that law is formally changed, at which point [if it comes to that] we will sit down and figure out what the new law directs.”)

+ + +

So now we know. We knew before, really, but didn’t have explicit confirmation. The long, agonizing slog, however, is finally over: from Pope Francis’ invitation to Cardinal Kasper to address the bishops in Rome in February of 2014 to the Pope’s letter last week to some Argentinean bishops affirming guidelines they had developed in a joint document that, in “exceptional cases,” people divorced and remarried (living in an “adulterous” relationship as we believed for 2,000 years in Western Christianity), may receive Holy Communion. This whole affair is bizarre. No other word will do. … Continue Reading

Panel Of National Radio Hosts… Supports Working For Trump To Win Presidential Election

By DEXTER DUGGAN

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Republicans who decline to back GOP nominee Donald Trump for president are engaging in a sort of self-admiring political purity that will “undermine” the ability to defeat leftism in the November elections, a national radio host told a packed ballroom here.
Talk host Dennis Prager told an audience of more than 900 people that “feeling good about themselves is dominant on the left,” but the same sort of preening shows up today among Republicans who, Prager asserted, say, “I am a conservative, but I am such a noble conservative, I will undermine” the party ticket this year.
Prager was one of the conservative Salem Radio Network’s national talk hosts who spoke at Phoenix outlet KKNT’s (960 AM) “Taking Back America” panel event at a hotel here on September 8 that lasted just over two hours.
None of the speakers supported the anti-Trump movement. However, Trump hadn’t been the first choice of some, like Prager, who reconciled himself to the Manhattan billionaire’s nomination.
Also speaking were national hosts Hugh Hewitt and Mike Gallagher, as well as political consultant Seth Leibsohn, who broadcasts a daily evening program from the KKNT studios.
Joining them for the second hour of the presentation was national author and filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza.
The audience repeatedly applauded support for Trump. … Continue Reading

Why Hyde Matters

By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK

Ever since the Supreme Court made abortion legal in the early 1970s, I have had to live with a paradox. I deal with it by repeating the bromide about “consistency being the hobgoblin of little minds.” I don’t know it is a logically sound tactic in this instance, but I know of no recourse.
The paradox is that, even though I agree that it is not wise to be a “single-issue voter,” I nonetheless view abortion as a deal-breaker: I won’t vote for a “pro-choice” candidate over one who is pro-life, regardless of the other items on the platforms of the candidates.
Fortunately, this has never been a real-life dilemma for me. For nearly a half-century now, in every election where I have voted, pro-life candidates also agree with me on economic matters, law and order, and foreign policy. They tend to be conservative on these other issues. And “pro-choice” politicians tend to be not. I guess there are exceptions in local elections somewhere, but “pro-choice” candidates in national elections always sound like Hillary Clinton and Chuck Schumer: big spenders, soft on defense and illegal immigration.
But I have often wondered what I would do if faced with a choice between a “fiscally conservative” Republican candidate such as “pro-choice” Susan Collins of Maine, and a liberal Democrat such as Indiana Sen. Joe Donnelly, a Notre Dame graduate with a solid pro-life position, on everything from protecting human life from conception to natural death, to banning federal health coverage that includes abortion — but who agrees with the Clintons on just about everything else. Would I be willing to vote for someone like Donnelly, even if it meant giving the Democrats more power in Washington? If you sense that I am squirming in my seat pondering such a decision, you are on the mark. … Continue Reading

“Never Trump?”. . . The Case Against “Sitting Out” The Presidential Election

By BRIAN CLOWES

Part 3

“If this is a sign of how religious liberty claims will be treated in the years ahead, those who value religious freedom have cause for great concern” — Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito, on laws specifically targeting Christians being upheld by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

+ + +

We have seen that eight or even four years of Hillary Clinton in the White House will result in a truly catastrophic headlong rush to the left in our court system. This will result in judges sweeping away all of the gains pro-lifers have been struggling to achieve over nearly half a century, and millions more preborns will die during her tenure.
But the unborn are not the only people in danger; unrestricted immigration will allow terrorists to flood over our borders. As ISIS has boasted, this will make it much easier for its members to bring death and destruction to even the smallest towns in the “Great Satan.”

Religious Freedom

Of Hillary Clinton’s many, many outright lies, the most laughable is her claim that “I’ve been fighting to defend religious freedom for years.” … Continue Reading

Let’s “Get Out the Vote” In 2016

By REY FLORES

How many of you are registered to vote? How many of your family and friends of voting age are registered to vote? These are important questions, my friends, because whatever is left of our nation is totally at stake here.
The reason I ask these questions is that I am currently conducting a series of powerful “Get Out the Vote” training workshops across the country as grassroots outreach coordinator for the fantastic Leadership Institute. These last few months have found me conducting training sessions in California, Florida, New York, Oklahoma, and Wisconsin — just to name a few places.
If you aren’t familiar with Leadership Institute, you should be.
Since 1979, the institute has prepared conservatives for success in politics, government, and the news media. Over the years, the Leadership Institute has trained more than 176,413 students and its mission is to increase the number and effectiveness of conservative activists and leaders in the public policy process.
To accomplish this, the Institute identifies, recruits, trains, and places conservatives in government, politics, and the media. We offer over 40 different types of training ranging from speech writing, on-camera interviewing skills, effective uses of social media, political campaign management, and high-dollar fundraising courses. … Continue Reading

Doctors Or Spin Doctors? . . . Tumbling Hillary, Catholic Officials Both Need Healthier View Of Reality

By DEXTER DUGGAN

When Hillary Clinton had her own towering 9-11 collapse at Ground Zero in New York City on September 11, the chills extended far beyond the alleged pneumonia living inside her pantsuit.
Implicitly acknowledging that no claims from the Clinton camp can be fully trusted, sweating Democratic Party officials began to worry if they should start thinking of a replacement for their aggressively pro-abortion presidential nominee.
After all, if a confession of pneumonia finally was wrung from her upon being cornered, how much worse might her rumored poor health actually be?
Even if Hillary feared she’d be looking straight into the tomb before too long, one can imagine this desperately power-hungry, strident woman ordering doctors with their syringes: “Just keep me going until Election Day, then I can take some weeks off to rest before my inauguration.”
Someone else who should have been feeling the chills were various U.S. Catholic Church officials. … Continue Reading