Thursday 28th March 2024

Home » Frontpage » Currently Reading:

Cascade Of News Events… Creates A Sensory Overload Around The Christmas Tree

December 10, 2017 Frontpage No Comments

By DEXTER DUGGAN

PHOENIX — If news events were Christmas ornaments, many homes’ trees would be shivering with sensory overload this season instead of shimmering beautifully.
Some of the baubles and trinkets among the pine needles would be lovely, others ugly. But there was such a profusion of them that limbs were near to breaking.
The synergy of social media, the assortment of electronic choices, and the Internet feed off each other and speed along news developments. The cascade of events suggested that society had taken up residence at the foot of Niagara Falls.
Each second, the Niagara Falls website says, 3,000 tons of water crash into the gorge. Does that sound like the volume of events sweeping us along today? Some would be lasting, some temporary, others entirely ephemeral. The depth of their durability in history might not be evident immediately.
Some reaction said that President Trump’s formal recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel on December 6 would be remembered by Jews not just for centuries but millennia, like Cyrus the Great decreeing rebuilding the Temple 2,500 years ago.
Other developments might not stretch over thousands of years but still had true significance, such as dominant U.S. “news” media choosing to become once again as openly partisan as when newspapers had “Democrat” or “Republican” as part of their titles.
Then there were news items that might burn up a lot of oxygen for a few months, but would they even be useful as trivia questions a few years hence?
Capturing attention as December 25 drew nearer were such events as:
Continued revelations that federal special counsel Robert Mueller’s team is riddled with partisan Democratic activists entirely unsuited to carry forward any impartial investigation of Republican President Trump’s administration, and unable to view the case as anything other than a golden opportunity to undo Trump’s legitimate presidential victory in 2016. Indeed, Mueller had concealed the evidence of partisan bias;
Argument before the U.S. Supreme Court in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission on whether people of faith such as Colorado baker Jack Phillips have freedom of conscience or must crumple before bureaucrats ordering them to honor serious personal sexual disorientation. The case often was misreported to say Phillips simply wouldn’t fill customer orders;
The acquittal of illegal alien José Inez Garcia Zarate on serious charges in his fatal shooting of innocent bystander Kate Steinle in San Francisco in 2015. He was free to roam only because of San Francisco’s appalling “sanctuary city” leftist policy of releasing into the public serious lawbreakers whom the federal government wants to deport;
The remarkable financial donation of $100 by putatively pro-life U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake (R., Ariz.) to the Senate campaign of radically pro-abortion Democrat Doug Jones in Alabama. It probably wasn’t so remarkable that Flake donated “across the aisle” — Flake, like his anti-Trump Arizona teammate Sen. John McCain, may seem more comfortable with liberal Democrats than the GOP. But it was the small dollar amount.
Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, a foe of Flake, reportedly mocked him, “Come on, brother, if you’re going to write a check, write a check. . . . Man, you are a total embarrassment.”
Flake seemed so proud of his little check to radical Jones that he even posted its image for everyone to see on Twitter, with “Country over party” arrogantly written on the memo line. Flake has made much of his self-assumed moral superiority, but his small symbolic donation to Jones actually was proof of Flake placing party — that is, the liberal Democratic Party — over the national welfare.
In passing, one also might wonder why the middle-aged Flake’s December 5, 2017, check on a joint account with his wife, Cheryl, was only number 221. Had he only recently opened a new checking account?
Another anti-Trump U.S. Republican senator, Ben Sasse, a pro-lifer representing Nebraska, pointedly said Flake didn’t have to donate to either candidate in the Alabama special election if he didn’t like the Republican nominee.
“This donation is a bad idea,” Sasse tweeted. “It’s possible to be against both partial-birth abortion and child molestation. Happily, most Americans are.”
Sasse shortly followed with another tweet that he “said from day one I wouldn’t vote for either of them.”
The other candidate in that December 12 election is pro-lifer Republican Roy Moore, accused of having forced himself on several teen-age females decades ago.
Although Moore is only one of a number of politicians, often liberal Democrats, facing sexual-harassment charges these days, what’s notable in his race is that the Republican establishment strongly opposed Moore’s independent-minded conservative candidacy well before any of the harassment charges against him.
Indeed, as soon as the initial accusation was made, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) and McCain, among others, immediately called for Moore to drop out. This looked suspiciously like a set-up. And Moore’s loss would leave the U.S. Senate almost evenly split, with a precarious GOP majority of only 51 to 49 — just the way Republican stand-patters opposed to reform might prefer.
Recent polls tended to show Moore recovering among voters after the shock of the initial accusations destroyed his strong lead. One speculation was that Alabamans didn’t appreciate distant Northeasterners telling them how to vote.
Dov Fischer, a southern California adjunct professor of law and a rabbi, warned at the American Spectator site that Democrats were using a familiar tactic in the Alabama race, trying to shame moral traditionalists, in effect, into abandoning the candidate who supports their views and voting against themselves.
“They make Republicans feel guilty. They con Christians and religious Catholics and observant Jews into feeling that, somehow, there is a religious or moral imperative to abandon a critical United States Senate seat,” Fischer wrote.
“Then they cynically scoop it up, cobbling together Congressional majorities built on the hands and in the trousers of their House icons and their Senate royalty like Al Franken, Ted Kennedy, Chris Dodd, and other gems.”
The results of the election should be known before this hard-copy issue of The Wanderer reaches some readers. Observers will have to wait to learn how lasting the effects of this contentious campaign are.

Looking For Attention

Lest someone believe that Flake’s check to Jones was small because he was about maxed out on political giving, Federal Election Commission records show Flake not having done much candidate donation.
Arizona conservative Republican consultant Constantin Querard told The Wanderer on December 6 that Flake was just aiming to get media attention.
“It was typical Jeff Flake — all photo op and no substance,” Querard said. “The amount was insignificantly small coming from someone who makes nearly $200,000 a year. And Roy Moore’s campaign is smart enough that they’ll raise at least $10,000 because of it. So Flake did almost nothing to help the cause he claims to care about, actually ends up doing real harm to it, and gets himself back in the media’s eye for a while.
“Plus, he just gave his money to a man who supports abortion up until the moment of birth (partial-birth abortion) while claiming to be giving for moral reasons,” Querard added. “The smart thing for him to have done is to have done nothing and given nothing to either candidate. Naturally, he opted for the media attention.”
Meanwhile, Stephen Kruiser, a conservative activist and co-founder of the first Los Angeles Tea Party, posted at the American Spectator website:
“You can be steeped in conservative principles and oppose any number of Republican candidates. Once you’re providing financial assistance to a very public supporter of abortion, you’ve abandoned the right to call yourself a conservative. Giving comfort to the pro-abortion crowd isn’t worth whatever point Flake was trying to make there.”
As for the trial of the illegal alien accused of killing Kate Steinle, The Wanderer asked northern California conservative commentator Barbara Simpson if she thought San Francisco jurors were thumbing their noses at the nation in defense of illegal immigration and having a sanctuary city.
Simpson replied that the defendant’s immigration status, criminal record, and previous deportations never were mentioned at the trial by either prosecution or defense.
Instead, she said, “I think the focus was put on the gun, and I suspect the jury was filled with people who are afraid of guns, want gun control and have never touched a gun. In fact, at the end, they asked the judge for the opportunity to handle the gun to see how the trigger worked, and the judge refused their request, saying he would not allow ‘any experimentation with evidence’.”
Phoenix conservative Republican activist Rob Haney told The Wanderer he thought the Democratic Party’s negative influence in California factored into the trial verdict.
“California has become the showcase for the Democrat Party’s destruction of Western civilization’s core values,” Haney said, adding that the verdict on “a frequently deported illegal alien was to be expected in the California system of injustice. The Democrats have complete control of all the avenues of power in the state. The news media, entertainment industry, and universities are also controlled by an overwhelmingly left-wing hierarchy.
“Because of the radical-left indoctrination received by the residents of California, the Steinle trial would have had to have been moved to a flyover state for justice to have prevailed,” Haney said. “A sanctuary state like California is going to protect the illegal alien in all circumstances. Their population now demands it.”

Media Meltdown

Meanwhile, dominant media continued to produce one incredibly inaccurate report after another that had a curious way of usually leaning the way liberal media people would prefer them to be. That may please their biased views, but also continues to persuade many of the public that even august news institutions are fakers and liars.
An editorial posted December 5 at the conservative Washington Examiner, headlined, “Media meltdown and the damage it does to democracy,” noted some of the latest propaganda efforts:
“News media misreported stories in one direction, much as when all the mistakes in a cheat’s tax return, oddly, tend to reduce what he owes. In other words, every major ‘mistake’ in the weekend’s reporting tended to confirm what biased, left-liberal reporters already believe or affect to believe. . . .”
“These biases and the inability of reporters to suppress them long enough to do a good job prompts proper public doubt about everything the national news media say. This is bad. It’s very bad,” the Examiner said.
A concrete example was provided in a November 30 article at The Federalist site by Saritha Prabhu, an immigrant from India who described herself as a liberal Democrat but who lost faith after observing coverage by openly slanted media, leading her to agree with “what President Trump has been saying for some time: that they are often dishonest and biased. . . . I watch and read their political coverage with cynical, distrusting eyes.
“It’s not just our politics that is broken; our media is broken too, and hopelessly,” Prabhu wrote. “The bias used to be hidden, but now it is open, glaring, and shameless. Our media outlets have become very tribal and are openly rooting for or against the party and politician of their choice — truth, fairness, honesty, justice, and journalistic principles be damned.”

Share Button

2019 The Wanderer Printing Co.

Vatican and USCCB leave transgender policy texts unpublished

While U.S. bishops have made headlines for releasing policies addressing gender identity and pastoral ministry, guidelines on the subject have been drafted but not published by both the U.S. bishops’ conference and the Vatican’s doctrinal office, leaving diocesan bishops to…Continue Reading

Biden says Pope Francis told him to continue receiving communion, amid scrutiny over pro-abortion policies

President Biden said that Pope Francis, during their meeting Friday in Vatican City, told him that he should continue to receive communion, amid heightened scrutiny of the Catholic president’s pro-abortion policies.  The president, following the approximately 90-minute-long meeting, a key…Continue Reading

Federal judge rules in favor of Gov. DeSantis’ mask mandate ban

MIAMI (LifeSiteNews) – A federal judge this week handed Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis another legal victory on his mask mandate ban for schools. On Wednesday, Judge K. Michael Moore of the Southern District of Florida denied a petition from…Continue Reading

The Eucharist should not be received unworthily, says Nigerian cardinal

Priests have a duty to remind Catholics not to receive the Eucharist in a state of serious sin and to make confession easily available, a Nigerian cardinal said at the International Eucharistic Congress on Thursday. “It is still the doctrine…Continue Reading

Donald Trump takes a swipe at Catholics and Jews who did not vote for him

Donald Trump complained about Catholics and Jews who did not vote for him in 2020. The former president made the comments in a conference call featuring religious leaders. The move could be seen to shore up his religious conservative base…Continue Reading

Y Gov. Kathy Hochul Admits Andrew Cuomo Covered Up COVID Deaths, 12,000 More Died Than Reported

When it comes to protecting people from COVID, Andrew Cuomo is already the worst governor in America. New York has the second highest death rate per capita, in part because he signed an executive order putting COVID patients in nursing…Continue Reading

Prayers For Cardinal Burke . . . U.S. Cardinal Burke says he has tested positive for COVID-19

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — U.S. Cardinal Raymond L. Burke said he has tested positive for the virus that causes COVID-19. In an Aug. 10 tweet, he wrote: “Praised be Jesus Christ! I wish to inform you that I have recently…Continue Reading

Democrats Block Amendment Banning Late-Term Abortions, Stopping Abortions Up to Birth

Senate Democrats have blocked an amendment that would ban abortions on babies older than 20 weeks. During consideration of the multi-trillion spending package, pro-life Louisiana Senator John Kennedy filed an amendment to ban late-term abortions, but Democrats steadfastly support killing…Continue Reading

Transgender student wins as U.S. Supreme Court rebuffs bathroom appeal

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed a victory to a transgender former public high school student who waged a six-year legal battle against a Virginia county school board that had barred him from using the bathroom corresponding…Continue Reading

New York priest accused by security guard of assault confirms charges have now been dropped

NEW YORK, June 17, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) — A New York priest has made his first public statement regarding the dismissal of charges against him.  Today Father George W. Rutler reached out to LifeSiteNews and other media today with the following…Continue Reading

21,000 sign petition protesting US Catholic bishops vote on Biden, abortion

More than 21,000 people have signed a letter calling for U.S. Catholic bishops to cancel a planned vote on whether President Biden should receive communion.  Biden, a Catholic, supports abortion rights and has long come under attack from some Catholics over that…Continue Reading

Bishop Gorman seeks candidates to fill two full time AP level teaching positions for the 2021-2022 school year in the subject areas of Calculus/Statistics and Physics

Bishop Thomas K. Gorman Regional Catholic School is a college preparatory school located in Tyler, Texas. It is an educational ministry of the Catholic Diocese of Tyler led by Bishop Joseph Strickland. The sixth through twelfth grade school provides a…Continue Reading

Untitled 5 Untitled 2

Attention Readers:

  Welcome to our website. Readers who are familiar with The Wanderer know we have been providing Catholic news and orthodox commentary for 150 years in our weekly print edition.


  Our daily version offers only some of what we publish weekly in print. To take advantage of everything The Wanderer publishes, we encourage you to su
bscribe to our flagship weekly print edition, which is mailed every Friday or, if you want to view it in its entirety online, you can subscribe to the E-edition, which is a replica of the print edition.
 
  Our daily edition includes: a selection of material from recent issues of our print edition, news stories updated daily from renowned news sources, access to archives from The Wanderer from the past 10 years, available at a minimum charge (this will be expanded as time goes on). Also: regularly updated features where we go back in time and highlight various columns and news items covered in The Wanderer over the past 150 years. And: a comments section in which your remarks are encouraged, both good and bad, including suggestions.
 
  We encourage you to become a daily visitor to our site. If you appreciate our site, tell your friends. As Catholics we must band together to rediscover our faith and share it with the world if we are to effectively counter a society whose moral culture seems to have no boundaries and a government whose rapidly extending reach threatens to extinguish the rights of people of faith to practice their religion (witness the HHS mandate). Now more than ever, vehicles like The Wanderer are needed for clarification and guidance on the issues of the day.

Catholic, conservative, orthodox, and loyal to the Magisterium have been this journal’s hallmarks for five generations. God willing, our message will continue well into this century and beyond.

Joseph Matt
President, The Wanderer Printing Co.

Untitled 1

Catechism

Today . . .

Abortion Advocates No Longer Consider It “A Necessary Evil,” They Celebrate Killing Babies

Last week, Kamala Harris became the first vice president in U.S. history to make a public visit to an abortion clinic. Though the Democratic party’s support for abortion is nothing new, Harris’ Planned Parenthood appearance does illustrate how that support has become a flagrant celebration of abortion as a public and personal good, essential to both “freedom” and to “healthcare.” At the appearance, Harris proclaimed,  It is only right and fair that people have access…Continue Reading

Wisconsin Supreme Court says Catholic charity group cannot claim religious tax exemption

The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that a major Catholic charity group’s activities were not “primarily” religious under state law, stripping the group of a key tax break and ordering it to pay into the state unemployment system. Catholic Charities Bureau (CCB) last year argued that the state had improperly removed its designation as a religious organization.  The charity filed a lawsuit after the state said it did not qualify to be considered as an organization…Continue Reading

Walgreens and CVS Will Start Selling Abortion Pills That Kill Babies

The two largest pharmacies in America will start selling abortion pills this month that end the lives of unborn children by starting them to death. Walgreens and CVS will both sell the abortion pills despite the fact that they kill a developing human being and have killed at least dozens of women and injured tens of thousands more. They plan to initially roll out abortion drug sales in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, California…Continue Reading

Cardinal Burke announces novena to Our Lady of Guadalupe for ‘crises of our age’

VATICAN CITY (PerMariam) — Raymond Cardinal Burke has announced the start of a global, nine-month novena to Our Lady of Guadalupe, calling on Catholics to beseech Mary’s intercession on the Church and the world in the face of the “crises of our age.” In a new endeavour published online over the weekend, Cardinal Burke announced a novena beginning in March, and culminating on the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12.

Texas attorney general targets Catholic nonprofit, alleges it facilitates illegal immigration

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Feb 21, 2024 / 21:15 pm Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is trying to shut down a Catholic nonprofit organization in El Paso based on allegations that the group may be facilitating illegal immigration, harboring immigrants who entered the country illegally, and engaging in human smuggling.  Paxton filed a lawsuit against the nonprofit Annunciation House, which has operated in the state for nearly 50 years. The lawsuit asks the District Court of El Paso…Continue Reading

The King of Kings

Cindy Paslawski We are at the end of the Church year. We began with Advent a year ago, commemorating the time awaiting the coming of the Christ and we are ending these weeks later with a vision of the future, a vision of Christ the King of the Universe on His throne before us all.…Continue Reading

7,000 Pro-Lifers March In London

By STEVEN ERTELT LONDON (LifeNews) — Over the weekend, some seven thousand pro-life people in the UK participated in the March for Life in London to protest abortion.They marched to Parliament Square on Saturday, September 2 under the banner of “Freedom to Live” and had to deal with a handful of radical abortion activists.During the…Continue Reading

An Appeal For Prayer For The Armenian People

By RAYMOND LEO CARDINAL BURKE (Editor’s Note: His Eminence Raymond Cardinal Burke on August 29, 2023, issued this prayer for the Armenian people, noting their unceasing love for Christ, even in the face of persecution.) + + On the Feast of the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, having a few days ago celebrated the…Continue Reading

Robert Hickson, Founding Member Of Christendom College, Dies At 80

By MAIKE HICKSON FRONT ROYAL, Va. (LifeSiteNews) — Robert David Hickson, Jr., of Front Royal, Va., died at his home on September 2, 2023, at 21:29 p.m. after several months of suffering and after having received the Last Rites of the Catholic Church. He was surrounded by friends and family.Robert is survived by me —…Continue Reading

The Real Hero Of “Sound of Freedom”… Says The Film Has Strengthened The Fight Against Child Trafficking

By ANA PAULA MORALES (CNA) —Tim Ballard, a former U.S. Homeland Security agent who risked his life to fight child trafficking, discussed the impact of the movie Sound of Freedom, which is based on his work, in an August 29 interview with ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. “I’ve spent more than 20 years helping…Continue Reading

Advertisement

Our Catholic Faith (Section B of print edition)

Catholic Replies

Editor’s Note: This lesson on medical-moral issues is taken from the book Catholicism & Ethics. Please feel free to use the series for high schoolers or adults. We will continue to welcome your questions for the column as well. The email and postal addresses are given at the end of this column. Special Course On Catholicism And Ethics (Pages 53-59)…Continue Reading

Color Politics An Impediment To Faith

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK The USCCB is rightly concerned about racism, as they should be about any sin. In the 2018 statement Open Wide Our Hearts, they affirm the dignity of every human person: “But racism still profoundly affects our culture, and it has no place in the Christian heart. This evil causes great harm to its victims, and…Continue Reading

Trademarks Of The True Messiah

By MSGR. CHARLES POPE (Editor’s Note: Msgr. Charles Pope posted this essay on September 2, and it is reprinted here with permission.) + + In Sunday’s Gospel the Lord firmly sets before us the need for the cross, not as an end in itself, but as the way to glory. Let’s consider the Gospel in three stages.First: The Pattern That…Continue Reading

A Beacon Of Light… The Holy Cross And Jesus’ Unconditional Love

By FR. RICHARD D. BRETON Each year on September 14 the Church celebrates the Feast Day of the Exultation of the Holy Cross. The Feast Day of the Triumph of the Holy Cross commemorates the day St. Helen found the True Cross. It is fitting then, that today we should focus on the final moments of Jesus’ life on the…Continue Reading

Our Ways Must Become More Like God’s Ways

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Twenty-Fifth Sunday In Ordinary Time (YR A) Readings: Isaiah 55:6-9Phil. 1:20c-24, 27aMatt. 20:1-16a In the first reading today, God tells us through the Prophet Isaiah that His thoughts are not our thoughts and His ways are not our ways. This should not come as a surprise to anyone, especially when we look at what the Lord…Continue Reading

The Devil And The Democrats

By FR. DENIS WILDE, OSA States such as Minnesota, California, Maryland, and others, in all cases with Democrat-controlled legislatures, are on a fast track to not only allow unborn babies to be murdered on demand as a woman’s “constitutional right” but also to allow infanticide.Our nation has gotten so used to the moral evil of killing in the womb that…Continue Reading

Crushed But Unbroken . . . The Martyrdom Of St. Margaret Clitherow

By RAY CAVANAUGH The late-1500s were a tough time for Catholics in England, where the Reformation was in full gear. A 1581 law prohibited Catholic religious ceremonies. And a 1584 Act of Parliament mandated that all Catholic priests leave the country or else face execution. Some chose to remain, however, so they could continue serving the faithful.Also taking huge risks…Continue Reading

Advertisement(2)