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Silencing Free Speech

March 10, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Silencing Free Speech

By JUDGE ANDREW P. NAPOLITANO “In short, we do not need good laws to restrain bad men. We need good men to restrain bad laws” — G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936).Why do people in power try to silence speech with which they disagree?Last week produced news about the suppression of speech on university campuses. There, the suppression usually occurs through the power of intimidation before the speech is given. Yet, most public lectures on college campuses are public accommodations, meaning the landowner — the university — cannot bar the entry of audience members because of their political views, nor can it silence the speakers because of theirs.Ordinarily, the owner of private property can impose whatever regulations he wishes upon those who voluntarily…Continue Reading

Neither Left Nor Right, But Catholic . . . What The Democratic Party Has Become

March 9, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Neither Left Nor Right, But Catholic . . . What The Democratic Party Has Become

By STEPHEN M. KRASON Even though the Democratic Party for many decades was a magnet for Catholics — after all, it was the party of the working class and Irish, Italian, and Eastern European immigrants — it has long had a checkered history. It was, as I recalled one scholar recounting in a lecture, the party of slavery, Jim Crow, the most flagrant suppression of civil liberties in our history (during World War I), and the Japanese internment during World War II.The Democratic Party of today, however, has descended much further into the depths. It has become the party of irrationality, fantasy, hypocrisy, disregarding of the rule of law for reasons of political opportunism, and repression of those who dare…Continue Reading

Canadian Bishops’ Charitable Arm . . . To End Partnerships With Groups In Conflict With Catholic Teaching

March 8, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Canadian Bishops’ Charitable Arm . . . To End Partnerships With Groups In Conflict With Catholic Teaching

OTTAWA (CNA) — The Canadian bishops’ conference announced February 25 that after a review of organizations that receive project funding from their international development agency, it will discontinue 24 partnerships over concerns about compatibility with Church teaching.“In examining the partner organizations, the joint subcommittee focused its work around several questions, including whether the partner supported anything contrary to Catholic moral or social teaching, whether its actions might mislead others with respect to the same, whether the partner’s professed values align with its actions online and on the ground, and whether the partner’s actions could undermine the credibility of the Bishops in Canada or in the host country,” the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops said.The Canadian bishops and the Canadian Catholic…Continue Reading

The Perilous Slide From Sentiment To Sentimentality

March 7, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on The Perilous Slide From Sentiment To Sentimentality

By DONALD DeMARCO A sentiment is an emotion or a feeling that can be the basis of an idea. Sentimentality is an emotion or feeling that is closed in on itself. The sentimentalist is locked up in his own feelings, severed from a world which may be perceived as too harsh.Synonyms for sentimental include “gushy,” “sugary,” “cloying,” “maudlin,” and “mawkish.” Sentimentality is fine as far as it goes, but it should not go very far. One cannot build an adequate philosophy of love on pure sentimentality. Love soon encounters practical imperatives. And yet, this attitude of sentimentality can be highly seductive.Consider the seventy-third Quatrain of Omar Khayyam’s immortal Rubaiyat: Ah Love! Could thou and I with Fate conspireTo grasp this…Continue Reading

Is Biden Re-Enlisting In The Forever Wars?

March 6, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Is Biden Re-Enlisting In The Forever Wars?

By PATRICK J. BUCHANAN Thursday, February 25, in its first military action, the Biden Pentagon sent two U.S. F-15Es to strike targets of Kataib Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Iraqi militia just inside the eastern border of Syria.The U.S. strikes were in retaliation for a missile attack on a U.S. base in Irbil, capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, which killed a contractor and wounded a U.S. soldier.“We’re confident that the target was being used by the same Shia militia that conducted the strikes,” said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.But Democratic Senators Tim Kaine and Chris Murphy want to know where President Joe Biden got his authority to launch attacks in Syria, where there was no clear or present danger to any U.S. troops.Days before…Continue Reading

Our Darkest Day

March 5, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Our Darkest Day

By DEREK BECHER In all of our weakness, we scorned and humiliated You.Despite the good You brought, and the love You shared,Together, we condemned You to a horrifying deathOnly because You were different from us — loving all unconditionally.You loved the sinners, You helped the poor, the sick, and the downtrodden.And yet, betrayed and denied by those You loved, we beat You and had You scourged:Your head became bloodied by the thorns, and Your back — shredded by the whip.And we ridiculed You as You stumbled, carrying that heavy wood.And in the midday darkness, to the dismay and despair of those who still cared,We nailed Your hands and Your feet to the woodAnd raised You there so that Your body…Continue Reading

$1.9 Trillion “COVID-19” Bill… Would Pay For Abortions And NEA-Defined “Art”

March 4, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on $1.9 Trillion “COVID-19” Bill… Would Pay For Abortions And NEA-Defined “Art”

By TERENCE P. JEFFREY Two years ago, the National Endowment for the Arts awarded a $25,000 grant to a group called Fresh Meat Productions, which is based in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco congressional district.This taxpayer-funded grant, according to the NEA, went to “support a national tour of Boys in Trouble,” which it described as a work “about navigating masculinity and gender in contemporary America.”What exactly was this production that you and other hardworking Americans paid to send on the road?Fresh Meat Productions has posted a summary on its website. “Boys in Trouble,” it says, “is a timely and urgent commentary on contemporary masculinity — these powerful dances place a trans and queer lens onto intersectional questions of embodiment,…Continue Reading

In Confidential Interviews . . . Catholic Bishops Talk COVID, Joe Biden, Pope Francis

March 3, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on In Confidential Interviews . . . Catholic Bishops Talk COVID, Joe Biden, Pope Francis

By KEVIN JONES DENVER (CNA) — A series of one-on-one interviews with more than two dozen bishops has revealed significant concern among the Church leaders over the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic and political tensions.The interviews, conducted by longtime Catholic commentator Francis X. Maier, show the bishops largely united in concerns about the presidency of Joe Biden, while also combining sincere support for Pope Francis with frustrations over his papacy.“The place of religious faith in American culture has been diminishing for several decades. COVID and the increasingly toxic nature of our politics have accelerated that trend,” Maier told Catholic News Agency February 22.“Most bishops are aware of that sea change and are trying their best to find fresh ways of…Continue Reading

Masterpiece Cakeshop Attorney . . . No, Religious Freedom For Wedding Vendors Isn’t Harmful

March 2, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Masterpiece Cakeshop Attorney . . . No, Religious Freedom For Wedding Vendors Isn’t Harmful

DENVER (CNA) — Ahead of a significant Supreme Court case that could determine whether Catholic adoption agencies can stay open in the U.S., a religious freedom attorney has criticized an article arguing against religious freedom protections.“To the extent that this article proves anything, it’s that all creative professionals feel freer to exercise their constitutional rights, which is a good thing for every American,” Jake Warner, legal counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom, said February 17.Warner was responding to a February 6 article in The Atlantic by law professor Netta Barak-Corren. The article argued that religious freedom protections for wedding vendors cause harm to self-identified LGBT couples and that perhaps no religious freedom exemptions should be granted.In recent years, Warner has represented…Continue Reading

Who Owns Your Face?

March 1, 2021 Featured Today Comments Off on Who Owns Your Face?

By JUDGE ANDREW P. NAPOLITANO After listening to Dr. Anthony Fauci recently suggest that we should expect to be wearing two masks on our faces everywhere we go until the end of 2022, I began thinking again about first principles.Fauci is entitled to express his opinions. Yet, because he is the president’s chief adviser on COVID-related medical matters, I cringed when I heard what he said. Was this a trial balloon or did he mean it literally? Are these suggestions or will they become commands with the purported force of law?Because the Constitution is the supreme law of the land, it governs the government wherever it goes and whatever it does. The original purpose of the Constitution was twofold: to…Continue Reading