Brown Pelican Society of Louisiana

By Steven Ertelt, LifeNews.com Editor, July 30, 2010

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — The Obama administration has approved the bid by cloning company Geron to undertake the first trial involving the use of embryonic stem cells in humans. They have never been used before in people because the cells cause tumors and have immune system rejection issues when tried in animals.

Scientists and pro-life advocates say human embryonic stem cells are not ready for trial because problems associated with the cells in animals haven’t been solved. The embryonic stem cells still cause tumors and have issues with the immune system rejecting the injection of the cells.

The Food and Drug Administration has initially placed the trial on hold but Geron indicated today that the agency is now allowing it to proceed with an early stage trial on an stem cell therapy for acute spinal cord injury.

The FDA placed a hold on the trial last August, when evidence showed Geron’s GRNOPC1 encountered safety issues when used in animal studies. Geron’s own data showed higher frequency of small cysts within the injury site in the spinal cord of animals injected with the embryonic cells…..continued………….

http://lifenews.com/bio3137.html

“We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.”

Says great things came out of Lyndon B. Johnson’s 1965 Great Society”; tells seniors that “good things are coming” under (Obamacare) including free preventive checkups and lower-cost prescriptions for Medicare recipients.…..Did he mention Death Panels?

Online:  Andy Griffith ad: http://tinyurl.com/22wnrrp

http://apnews.myway.com//article/20100730/D9H9EIV03.html

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

Edmund Burke   (1729 – 1797)

—————————————————

Do not be conquered by evil but conquer evil with good.

Romans 12: 21

http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/romans/romans12.htm

Edmund Burke   (1729 – 1797)

READ:  Inside a Radical Manifesto“You Don’t Need A Weatherman To Know Which Way The Wind Blows”

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Definition: Ethics

Many writers regard ethics (Gr. ethike) as any scientific treatment of the moral order and divide it into theological, or Christian, ethics (moral theology) and philosophical ethics (moral philosophy). What is usually understood by ethics, however, is philosophical ethics, or moral philosophy, and in this sense the present article will treat the subject. Moral philosophy is a division of practical philosophy. Theoretical, or speculative, philosophy has to do with being, or with the order of things not dependent on reason, and its object is to obtain by the natural light of reason a knowledge of this order in its ultimate causes. Practical philosophy, on the other hand, concerns itself with what ought to be, or with the order of actshuman and which therefore depend upon our reason. It is also divided into logic and ethics. The former rightly orders the intellectualtruth, while the latter directs the activities of the will; the object of the former is the true; that of the latter is the good. which are activities and teaches the proper method in the acquirement of

Hence ethics may be defined as the science of the moral rectitude of human acts in accordance with the first principles of natural reason.

Logic and ethics are normative and practical sciences, because they prescribe norms or rules for human activities and show how, according to these norms, a man ought to direct his actions. Ethics is pre-eminently practical and directive; for it orders the activity of the will, and the latter it is which sets all the other faculties of man in motion. Hence, to order the will is the same as to order the whole man. Moreover, ethics not only directs a man how to act if he wishes to be morally good, but sets before him the absolute obligation he is under of doing good and avoiding evil.

A distinction must be made between ethics and morals, or morality. Every people, even the most uncivilized and uncultured, has its own morality or sum of prescriptions which govern its moral conduct. Nature had so provided that each man establishes for himself a code of moral concepts and principles which are applicable to the details of practical life, without the necessity of awaiting the conclusions of science. Ethics is the scientific or philosophical treatment of morality. The subject-matter proper of ethics is the deliberate, free actions of man; for these alone are in our power, and concerning these alone can rules be prescribed, not concerning those actions which are performed without deliberation, or through ignorance or coercion. Besides this, the scope of ethics includes whatever has reference to free human acts, whether as principle or cause of action (law, conscience, virtue), or as effect or circumstance of action (merit, punishment, etc.). The particular aspect (formal object) under which ethics considers free acts is that of their moral goodness or the rectitude of order involved in them as human acts. A man may be a good artist or orator and at the same time a morally bad man, or, conversely, a morally good man and a poor artist or technician. Ethics has merely to do with the order which relates to man as man, and which makes of him a good man.  Sociology is at the present day considered by many as a scienceethics. If, however, by sociology is meant a philosophical treatment of society, it is a division of ethics; for the enquiry into the nature of society in general, into the origin, nature, object and purpose of natural societies (the family, the state) and their relations to one another forms an essential part of Ethics. If, on the other hand, sociology be regarded as the aggregate of the sciences which have reference to the social life of man, it is not a single science but a complexus of sciences; and among these, so far as the natural order is concerned, ethics has the first claim…………..

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05556a.htm

plural noun

1.

( used with a singular or plural verb ) a system of moral principles: the ethics of a culture.

2.

the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group, culture, etc.: medical ethics; Christian ethics.

3.

moral principles, as of an individual: His ethics forbade betrayal of a confidence.

4.

( usually used with a singular verb ) that branch of philosophy dealing with values relating to human conduct, with respect to the rightness and wrongness of certain actions and to the goodness and badness of the motives and ends of such actions.



Yesterday, President Obama delivered a major speech on education in an effort to garner support for his Race to the Top grant program and his push for national education standards and tests. The President’s remarks came on the heels of a speech delivered by Education Secretary Arne Duncan on Tuesday at the National Press Club, during which Duncan attempted to paint the Administration’s policies as part of a “quiet revolution.”

Duncan certainly got the quiet part right. Since his Administration came into office, President Obama has quietly been reworking the country’s education system, doing an end-run around normal legislative procedure. With the U.S. Department of Education’s (DOE) funding doubled thanks to the so-called “stimulus,” the Administration has little need or incentive to bother negotiating its education agenda through Congress. Instead, the DOE is using that windfall of funding and power to stage a significant overhaul of local schools; dangling grant money before cash-strapped states on the condition they adopt key pieces of the Obama education agenda. And this is all happening without public consideration, even though it means that parents will now have to trek to Washington to petition an unaccountable bureaucracy if they want to see changes in their children’s curriculum. Knocking on the door at the DOE (the lowest rated federal department) is unlikely to produce a response.

The push for national education standards and tests began last year when the National Governors Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) began writing standards for what all U.S. students should learn in school. Meanwhile, the Obama Administration has been backing the effort with federal dollars, pressing Race to the Top grants in front of fiscally starved states while making it clear that they also intend to make Title I funding (the largest federal education program at $14.5 billion) contingent upon acceptance of these standards. A number of states have signed onto the standards to position themselves for federal grants—without the American people ever having the opportunity to weigh in on such a drastic change that will soon be coming to a school near you.

Secretary Duncan’s use of the term revolution was also right on the mark. The federal government’s ever-expanding role in education, and now the Obama Administration’s push for national standards and tests, threatens the long-established right of parents to direct their children’s education and confuses a proper understanding of federalism. States model federalism for children by setting standards, tests, and curriculum. But that important lesson in self-government will be another unintended casualty of this standards overhaul now that the federal government is overreaching to set the educational terms for local schools—contrary to the spirit of the Constitution and the letter of federal law, which expressly prohibits federal involvement in standards, tests, and curriculum.

But it’s not just our deep-rooted principal of federalism that is at stake in President Obama’s education agenda; it’s also our ongoing pursuit of excellence that hangs in the balance. Continue reading →

Rep. Smith: Saving Our Hyde

While HHS squabbles with Republicans about why taxpayers are footing the bill for abortions under the health care law, Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) says that Congress should put the issue to rest once and for all. Instead of worrying about vague language and legislative loopholes, Rep. Smith is calling on members to pass a bill that would guarantee that no federal dollars will be used to take innocent human lives. Today, he and Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) introduced the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act which would be a blanket rejection of abortion in every facet of government spending–from the health care law to the Defense Authorization bill and every program in between. If it passes, the Hyde amendment would be permanent, saving pro-life Congressmen from the yearly battle they have over its reauthorization. Never again would members have to debate whether legislation does or doesn’t include conscience protections, since this bill would also codify the Hyde-Weldon clause that bars groups from discriminating against people who refuse to provide, refer, or pay for abortions. Other policies, like the amendments that block overseas abortion funding, would also become a concrete part of U.S. law.

This push is especially timely given that a group of pro-abortion Senators are trying to open the doors to abortion on military bases. Meanwhile, HHS officials and other abortion proponents still insist that the new health care law won’t fund abortions–despite an independent analysis from Congressional Research Service, which reported that there’s nothing stopping the agency from covering the procedure in its high risk pools. Regardless of what Americans think about the legality of abortion, they object to paying for it by overwhelming majorities–which could explain why the Smith-Lipinski bill has such broad bipartisan support. Any member who claims to be moderate on abortion knows that they have to vote for this legislation to prove it. Passing the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act is the only way to make pro-life policies permanent and apply them across the federal government. Even the Left should have no trouble supporting a bill that they insist is the status quo. Encourage your member to co-sponsor the Smith-Lipinski bill. Click here to contact them today!

Do Ask, We’ll Tell!

Check out today’s video clip with ADF Attorney Austin Nimocks for his take on how this repeal would silence Christians in all walks of military life.

Q: How will overturning this law affect military chaplains and other service members with faith-based convictions?

As Bob Maginnis points out in FRC’s Mission Compromised booklet, introducing open homosexuals into the military would seriously impact chaplains. They may be censored from speaking against homosexual behavior in chapels or counsel a service member confused about his sexuality to abstain from homosexual conduct. What’s more, they could face increased pressure to marry same-sex couples. These threats to religious liberty would make chaplains who stick by their convictions vulnerable, and some of them might choose leave the military altogether.

With Gambling Victory, Frank Bets on the House

“Congress is the one with the gambling problem,” or so says the Washington Times after the House Financial Services Committee voted to overturn UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act). Following Rep. Barney Frank’s (D-Mass.) lead, members passed H.R. 2267 out of committee, giving the full House a chance to vote on the largest expansion of online gambling ever. “With a $13.2 trillion credit line, federal lawmakers continue to make bad bets, doubling down on spending… in the vain hope that it will somehow pay off,” writes the Times. “Laying the foundation for Internet-specific taxes… will only enable… Congress to further jeopardize the country’s economic future.” Together with its companion bill, H.R. 4976, Rep. Frank claims that legalizing Internet gambling–and taxing it–will raise billions in federal and state revenues. Despite what he says, this bill isn’t about protecting free markets, but opening up a new questionable revenue stream for government spending.

For now, the future of Rep. Frank’s bill is unknown. Will Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) want to raise this controversial vote in September? Many think it’s unlikely. There’s a much better chance that she would turn this bill into a lame-duck vehicle. One surprise during yesterday’s committee vote was the group of seven Republicans who voted for the bill. Also, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), a previous supporter of Rep. Frank’s bill, voted “present” once he became aware that this bill would lead to a massive expansion of taxation of Internet commerce. His vote–and the leadership of Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.)–were the bright spots of the day. For more on who voted for an anti-federalist, pro-tax gambling bill, check out The Cloakroom Blog.

In the D.C. Circuit Court We Trust

In a victory that barely cracked the newswire, a federal appeals court threw out a case to strip “In God We Trust” from U.S. currency. An atheist in Texas had claimed that the national motto was unconstitutional, but even the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is comprised of some fairly liberal judges, tossed the lawsuit. Citing a 40-year-old Supreme Court precedent, the judges unanimously agreed that “The Statutes establishing ‘In God We Trust’ as our national motto and providing for its reproduction on United States currency do not violate the Establishment Clause.” Fortunately, the panel’s decision did more than protect religious liberty–it spared taxpayers and the courts a long, expensive, and drawn-out lawsuit.

Speaking of the importance of judges, FRC’s Church Ministries department has developed a number of resources for pastors on Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan. We encourage you to forward this link to your church leaders and ask them to share this information with their congregation before next week’s confirmation vote on the Senate floor!

http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=WU10G20&f=PG07J01

In the face of scandals like the homosexual agenda at a Manhattan parish, what’s a faithful Catholic to do?

• Read the script for this program

WATCH ONLINE:  http://www.youtube.com/user/RealCatholicTV#p/a/u/0/r2wzrEpdOVc

This program is from RealCatholicTV.com

by  Michael Ramirez

Obama’s Mean Streak
Ed Lasky
Barack Obama seems to have a pattern of using ceremonial or stately events as opportunities to ambush and humiliate people. More

The Obama Victory Reconsidered
Richard Baehr
Barack Obama’s presidential election victory in 2008 represents the most successful new product introduction in American history. More

Real Sherrod Story Still Untold
Jack Cashill
The numbers tell the story. More

Why the Electoral College Matters
Rick Moran
A campaign to circumvent the Elector College is underway, and it must be resisted. More

Gen. Jones is Not a Useful Idiot
Ken Blackwell
Our friends, the Russians. More

The Mom Thing
F. Owen Smith
Arlington National Cemetery is the biggest “mom thing” there is. More

….. “I had no idea it was a baby. I really thought it was just tissue and was just blown away that she had a head and arms and legs”….

By Kathleen Gilbert,  Catholic Exchange, July 30th, 2010

…. This revolution of Mother Teresa’s had an ideology, and it was in stark contrast to the reductionist ideologies produced by the 20th century, in which a person’s worth was calculated by their economic output, race, politics, youth, beauty or celebrity . . . Mother Teresa witnessed gloriously to the dignity of human life by loving those who appeared to be worthless.…..

Archdiocese of Columbo

It was in God’s Providence that Mother Teresa’s death was to be eclipsed by the tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales. It is probably inevitable that the 10th anniversary of their deaths should repeat the same pattern, but the nun would not want publicity for herself, only for the action of God, who had used her as the instrument of his purpose, and for her charism of serving the poorest of the poor.

Diana is an “icon”, Mother Teresa is a challenge, a sign of contradiction to contemporary sensibilities. Her courageous opposition to abortion and her support for traditional family earned her few plaudits among liberal and feminist circles, who continue to try to discredit her. She was an inconvenient saint even to some within the Church, for though she saw at first hand the injustices done to the poor, this did not make her embrace Liberation Theology, or to critique economic or political systems. (Which, we may ask, is more instantly attractive: to campaign to make poverty history, or to live in solidarity with the poor and serve them?) She was staunchly loyal to what the liberal-minded erroneously call the “Institutional Church” and to the Holy Father. She had a profound love and respect for priests and the priesthood and showed no ambition whatsoever to enter it herself. Her piety was of an old-fashioned stamp which emphasised the Mass, adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, the rosary and the evangelical counsels. She seemed to be totally fulfilled in a life of obedience and service to the Church and the poorest of the poor.

This saint of the slums had none of the political radicalism often born of such work. So it was that she once surprised a reporter in Brazil by saying that she was in favour of revolution – indeed, she and her Sisters in the Missionaries of Charity were working for one, she said: a revolution of love.

This revolution of Mother Teresa’s had an ideology, and it was in stark contrast to the reductionist ideologies produced by the 20th century, in which a person’s worth was calculated by their economic output, race, politics, youth, beauty or celebrity. Mother Teresa’s vision of a new world came from revelation. To her eyes, everyone came from the hand of a kind and Provident Creator, and everyone had an inalienable dignity because of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. He was there in every human life, most of all in his “distressing disguise” in the poorest of the poor.

Mother Teresa’s legacy includes her indefatigable opposition to the culture of death. Her opposition to abortion and euthanasia had total credibility, for she had committed herself to the defence of all those whom society rejects or sees as expendable, and her opposition was backed with an unlimited willingness to care for any would-be victims of these outrages. Ideas about human dignity quickly disintegrate in the face of human cruelty and misery unless someone is prepared to give them expression, to enflesh them. Mother Teresa witnessed gloriously to the dignity of human life by loving those who appeared to be worthless. She was not just pro-life by expressing moral revulsion at interventions in birth and dying; her charism was to affirm the dignity of all life, especially the life of those who appeared unloved and unlovable. In serving them, she rescued their dignity and restored their worth. She showed that this dignity which can be outraged by man’s inhumanity to man can equally be healed by the gift of an authentic love. Her revolution was, in that sense, in perfect imitation of the revolution brought by the Incarnation, which confers a dignity on the sinful, outcast human by embracing him in the love of the Word made Man. It was this love she saw everywhere, Christ she saw in everyone. She said she was sure we would all be judged by his words: “Whatever you did to the least of these, you did to me.”

Mother Teresa’s pro-life mentality caused her to speak of the poverty of the West, to alert us to a crisis of equal proportions to that of the slums of Calcutta. She spoke of the people metaphorically dying for want of love, for want of someone to listen to them, to smile at them, to love them. Her insistence that materialism and wealth have created a new kind of spiritual poverty in the wealthy nations should prevent us from seeing her just as the saint of the slums of Calcutta. We need to see the conditions in affluent 21st century Britain through the eyes of Mother Teresa’s pity.

St Thérèse would endorse her namesake’s insistence on fidelity to small tasks, to the daily round, as having immense value, the conviction that we do not need to do great things, “but only little things with great love”. The terrible doubts and absence of any sensible consolations Mother Teresa experienced, as we now know from the postulator of her Cause, also seem to confirm a spiritual affinity with Thérèse, and should encourage, rather than surprise us. That both of them could remain so faithful and rise to such heights of sanctity is a timely reminder to us of the ascendancy of the will over the emotions in the spiritual life, of the importance of duty. That she was a woman of a powerful will was obvious to those who had dealings with Mother Teresa, the extent to which she had surrendered it to God’s action is even more apparent in the light of her struggles. Displayed in all the houses of the order is one of her pithy sayings: “I want… I will, with God’s help, be holy.” As Thérèse, patron saint of missionaries, never left her convent, so Mother Teresa, famous for her tireless apostolate, would insist that her vocation was first a vocation to contemplation. When asked by a reporter what was the secret of her success she answered simply: “I pray.” The “how” of her revolution, as well as the “why”, centred on Jesus Christ.

At the centre of her life, at the centre of her work and mission, animating and comforting, was the Real Presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. The expression she used, of “touching the broken body” meant the Body of Christ in the Eucharistic feast. Her day was a lived and practical expression of the idea that the Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life. It would still surprise people, seeing her Sisters at work, to realise how much time they spend before the Blessed Sacrament.

And it is the priests and brothers and sisters of the Missionaries of Charity who are the final, and perhaps the most important, part of her legacy, for they embody her Spirit. Now numbering some 4,000 and working in 194 countries, they are a precious gift to the Church, especially for their consecration to a pristine form of poverty as a radical dependence on God’s Providence and in solidarity with the poorest of the poor. They attract vocations from all over the world, and the average age of the professed I would guess to be somewhere in the 30s. Some of their number have already witnessed to the faith with their lives, as Mother Teresa prophesied they would, in Yemen and Sierra Leone.

Father Hardon Visits Mother Teresa’s House of the Dying in Calcutta

[ Source – The Catholic Herald UK ]

http://www.archdioceseofcolombo.com/news.php?id=100



…There is a lesson that Calcutta burned deeply into my soul….

Fr. Robert Barron, Catholic Education Resource Center

I have been all across the world these past two years, filming for my documentary on Catholicism. With my team, I’ve travelled to Jerusalem, Rome, Madrid, Mexico City, Warsaw, Krakow, Auschwitz, Koln, New York, Philadelphia, Istanbul, Corinth, and Athens. But none of these places had a visceral impact to match that of the city I’ve just visited: Calcutta, India.

We had gone there to film in locales associated with the work of Mother Teresa and her sisters, and therefore, we didn’t spend much time in the relatively presentable parts of the city. We went to the slums where, in Mother’s famous phrase, “the poorest of the poor” lived.

Here are just some of the images that I trust will stay branded in my mind for the rest of my life: a child of about ten gathering horse manure with his bare hands in order to sell it; people bathing in the river filled with raw sewage; a mentally disturbed woman just outside of the Mother House of the Missionaries of Charity emitting a blood-curdling and other-worldly scream; garbage absolutely everywhere, as though the entire city were a trash heap; people whose only dwelling was the street or sidewalk; beggar children surrounding me and gesturing desperately to their mouths; a man at one of Mother’s hospitals with a goiter on his neck the size of a pumpkin; a Missionary of Charity sister, having just tended to a man bleeding from one of his ears, saying to me, “maggots again.”

When she was still a Loreto nun, Mother Teresa was making her way north of Calcutta by train to Darjeeling for a retreat. While she was riding on that train, she heard a voice inviting her to carry the light of Christ to the darkest places. Upon her return to Calcutta, she commenced the process that led eventually to the founding of the Missionaries of Charity, an order whose purpose would be to respond to that summons. This is the work that is carried on to this day by her sisters, in the meanest streets of Calcutta and in over five hundred establishments around the globe.

On the first day of our filming, we went to the Mother House of the community, the international headquarters of the Missionaries of Charity. I met a number of the sisters and had the privilege of speaking to Mother Prema, the current superior of the order. We visited Mother Teresa’s tiny cell, a room perhaps 12 feet by 12 feet, decorated by a small table and a bed with an impossibly thin mattress. The greatest joy of that day was to celebrate Mass near the tomb of Mother and to see many other pilgrims kneeling by her grave in deep prayer. On the second day, we filmed in a small hospital where the Missionaries of Charity care for children with mental and physical disabilities.

When we arrived, the electricity had just gone out and the room was stiflingly hot, since the fans had stopped. Everywhere the sisters and a large team of volunteers milled about, providing medical assistance, speaking to the kids, teaching some of them to sing simple songs, or just holding them. There was one sister, whose name I have forgotten but whose smile I will never forget. She was carrying in her arms a small girl of perhaps a year and half or two years old. The child was blind, her sightless eyes sunken in her head. I asked sister how they had come to care for this girl, and she told me that she had simply been abandoned on the street. “She is my special baby,” the sister said, and then she flashed this absolutely radiant smile, which told me that she had found a deep joy precisely in this hot, crowded hospital in the midst of one of the most squalid cities in the world.

“She is my special baby,” the sister said, and then she flashed this absolutely radiant smile, which told me that she had found a deep joy precisely in this hot, crowded hospital in the midst of one of the most squalid cities in the world.

We’re dealing with a deep mystery here. All of us human beings want joy. Everything we do and say, all of our actions and endeavors, are meant to produce contentment, peace, happiness. Even the most morally corrupt person, ultimately, wants joy. But how do we find it? The most elemental mistake – made consistently across the centuries to the present day – is to seek peace by filling up in ourselves something that we perceive to be missing.

We tell ourselves that we’d be happy if we just had enough pleasure, enough power, enough security, enough esteem. BUT THIS DOES NOT WORK. It is the supreme paradox of the Christian spiritual tradition that we become filled with joy precisely in the measure that we contrive a way to make of ourselves a gift. By emptying out the self in love for the other, we become filled to the brim with the divine life. The smile of that Missionary of Charity signaled the presence of a joy that no wealth, no security, no pleasure, no honor could possibly provide, and that can emerge even in the most miserable context. There is the lesson that Calcutta burned deeply into my soul.

ACKNOWLEDGEMEN: Father Robert Barron, “The Lesson of Calcutta.” Our Sunday Visitor (July 8, 2010).

http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/stories_of_faith_and_character/cs0462.htm

“Yesterday we learned of a new effort by Democrats in Washington to attack American citizens who speak their mind and peaceably assemble as ‘extremists or radicals.’ Demeaning tea party citizens, or other Americans who are simply saying ‘no’ to runaway spending, takeovers and bailouts, is beneath the dignity of a great political party and it smacks of desperation.”

“I don’t think you can lead out of fear.”

The service employee union (SEIU) has joined the administration’s attack on Arizona’s anti-illegal immigration law by using fear tactics, casting supporters of the law as totalitarians.

By Patrick Goodenough, International Editor, CNSNews, July 29, 2010

This screenshot from a video clip shows President Obama speaking about Hiroshima and Nagasaki during a joint press conference with then Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, in Tokyo on November 13, 2009. (Image: White House video)

(CNSNews.com) – The Japanese government on Thursday welcomed news that the a U.S. ambassador will for the first time attend the annual commemoration of the U.S. dropping an atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945.

The State Department announced that Ambassador John Roos would represent the U.S. at the August 6 event at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial, “to express respect for all of the victims of World War II.”

Asked why the gesture was being made at this time, spokesman Philip Crowley said, “At this particular point, we thought it was the right thing to do.”

Japanese media attributed the decision to President Obama’s agenda of pursuing “a world without nuclear weapons,” outlined in a speech in Prague last year.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku said Thursday it was the first time a U.S. government representative would attend the annual event. The Japanese government hoped the occasion will would provide the opportunity for the U.S. to deepen its understanding of Japan’s pledge to prevent another atomic catastrophe from taking place, he said.

According to Japanese media, Hiroshima city authorities, since the late 1990s, have invited all nuclear weapons powers to participate in the annual commemoration. While Russia, China, India and Pakistan had done so, the U.S., Britain and France had not.

This year marks the 65th anniversary of the dropping by the U.S. of atom bombs on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 and on Nagasaki three days later. An estimated 140,000 were killed in Hiroshima and about 80,000 in Nagasaki. Imperial Japan surrendered on Aug. 15, and with the formal signing on Sept. 2 the war was over.

Scholars and others have debated the decision since then, with supporters arguing that the devastating bombing pre-empted a greater loss of life on both sides which the continuing war and planned invasion of Japan would have entailed. Opponents regard it as an immoral act and a major war crime.

The Asahi Shimbun daily quoted Kota Kiya, a member of a Hiroshima victims group, as saying that because of public opinion in the U.S., an American apology for the bombing would be too difficult to achieve, but it was hoped the U.S. would attend the ceremony each year.

The Kyodo news agency said the head of a Hiroshima victims organization, Kazushi Kaneko, called for a U.S. apology.

“I want the U.S. representative to feel the realities of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima and correct the U.S. perception that the bombing was the right choice,” the 84-year-old was quoted as saying.

Ahead of a trip by Obama to Japan last November, invitations to the president from the mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki prompted speculation that he might offer an apology for the bombings.

Obama did not visit the two cities, citing time constraints, but said he would like to do so during his presidency. He plans to visit Japan again later this year, for an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

During last November’s visit, Obama was confronted by the issue in Tokyo, where during a joint press conference with then Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama a Japanese television reporter asked him if he would visit the two cities, adding, “What is your understanding of the historical meaning of the A-bombing in Hiroshima and Nagasaki?  Do you think it was the right decision?”

Obama sidestepped the nub of the question, saying, “Obviously Japan has unique perspective on the issue of nuclear weapons as a consequence of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And that I’m sure helps to motivate the prime minister’s deep interest in this issue.  I certainly would be honored, it would be meaningful for me to visit those two cities in the future.”

The reporter then asked, again, if the president believed the dropping of the bombs had been “right.”

Obama did not answer her, turning instead to another issue she had raised, relating to North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.

Roos, the U.S. ambassador, visited Hiroshima last year as did U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in 2008. Former President Jimmy Carter paid a visit to the Hiroshima memorial in 1984, three years after leaving the White House.

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/70168

…“This entire episode demonstrates what National Right to Life said in March – there is no language in the new health care law, and no language in Obama’s politically contrived March 24 executive order, that effectively prevents federal subsidies for abortion on demand,” Johnson asserted…..

Catholic News Agency, July 29, 2010

NRLC’s legislative director Doug Johnson.

Washington D.C. (CNA/EWTN News).- After reports recently surfaced that some of the new federally-funded high risk pool insurance programs in states across the U.S. were covering elective abortion, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a statement today, prohibiting the plans from covering the procedure.

The insurance pool programs for high-risk patients are part of a $5 billion federal funding program set up under the Affordable Health Care Act that was signed into law this March.

When states began to roll out their plans for the federal funds, the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) investigated plans in Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Maryland, all of which the pro-life group accused of funding abortion. Following the passage of the health care overhaul in March, President Obama signed an executive order which purported to ban federal funding of abortion.

Following media scrutiny, the HHS issued a new regulation on July 29, clarifying that the pool programs are prohibited from covering the procedure.

“The (high-risk pool) program,” the regulation states, “is Federally-created, funded, and administered (whether directly or through contract); it is a temporary Federal insurance program in which the risk is borne by the Federal government up to a fixed appropriation. As such, the services covered by the PCIP (Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan) program shall not include abortion services except in the case of rape or incest, or where the life of the woman would be endangered.”

“Much has been made of this policy by both sides of the debate,” White House Office of Health Reform Director Nancy-Ann DeParle commented today on the White House blog. “But, in reality, no new ground has been broken.” Continue reading →

“The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security.”

—James Madison, Federalist No. 45

July 30, 2010
Friday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time
Father Ernest Daly, LC

Matthew 13:54-58

Jesus came to his native place and taught the people in their synagogue. They were astonished and said, “Where did this man get such wisdom and mighty deeds? Is he not the carpenter´s son? Is not his mother named Mary and his brothers James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas? Are not his sisters all with us? Where did this man get all this?” And they took offense at him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and in his own house.” And he did not work many mighty deeds there because of their lack of faith.

Introductory Prayer: Lord, I believe in your power. I know that you are the Lord of all history. I trust that you are guiding my life. Thank you for showing me that you will triumph. Thank you for the triumph you have already achieved in my heart and in the hearts of so many people. I want to allow you to have total control over my life.

Petition: Lord, increase my faith in you.

1. Too Familiar with Jesus The people of Nazareth thought they knew all about Jesus. He had grown up among them. Apparently they had not seen anything extraordinary about him before he started his public ministry. They thought he was just like everyone else. So when they hear that he is doing miracles and teaching with authority, they do not believe it. Sometimes I also run the danger of putting limits on Christ’s power in my life. I see the unimpressive circumstances of my life and the recurrence of the same old problems. I do not believe that Christ can do something supernatural in the midst of an ordinary situation. Today I am receiving an invitation to step beyond the routine and believe more deeply in the power of Christ.

2. In My Own Backyard The solution to their deepest problems was in their own backyard. Yet, the people of Nazareth felt that such a familiar figure could not bring anything extraordinary. When the Church sometimes challenges me with some of her teachings – on charity, on family life, on the need to be a courageous witness –, do I sometimes find excuses, like saying that my circumstances are too difficult, or the Church does not understand my situation? Do I sometimes let the prophetic voice of the Church die in my heart? When I feel challenged by the Gospel and by the Church I should be thankful. Christ is inviting me to discover the deepest meaning of my life. He is giving me a chance to allow his presence to make a deep change in my life. He is allowing me to discover him in faith and is taking me beyond my comfort zone to the level of the coming of his Kingdom.

3. A Miracle Worker in Waiting What sort of miracles does Christ want to do in my life? Christ has a plan to make my life a luminous witness to the power of his grace. He wants to fill my life with his holiness and help me be a light for others. If I can shake off my superficiality and lack of faith, I will discover the powerful presence of the Savior who helps me live each moment with depth and love. He can do miracles in my life. He can help me live the virtues which are most costly for me. Am I willing to take a risk for Christ and trust him totally?

Conversation with Christ: Lord, I know you want to do great things in my life. Help me to see how you can transform the ordinary, seemingly unimportant circumstances of my day into moments when your grace triumphs. Enable me to be docile to your Holy Spirit, so he can do miracles in my life.

Resolution: I will increase my faith in Christ by taking a risk for him in some aspect of my spiritual or apostolic life.

CATHOLIC NEWS AGENCY, JULY 30, 2010

St. Peter Chrysologus is a Doctor of the Church. He was born in Italy around 406 and was named archbishop of Ravenna in 439. There he encountered a strong pagan influence and many lapsed faithful. Through his efforts, many people returned to the faith and paganism was eradicated in Ravenna.

St. Peter was a very caring pastor and an excellent preacher. Due to his excellent homilies, the people gave him the name “Chrysologus” (of golden words). Many of these texts still exist. He died at the age of 44 in the year 450.