Words of Relevance: Bret Stephens on Hillary and Political Opportunists

Bret Stephens, deputy editor of the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal wrote an interesting piece today questioning whether Hillary Clinton's self-reinvention  as a foreign-policy hawk is Kierkegaardian or Aristotelian, i.e., "Is the real 'you' the interior and subjective you; the you of your private whispers and good intentions?  Or are you only the sum of your public behavior, statements and actions?  Are you the you that you have been, and are?  Or are you what you are, perhaps, becoming?"  He then, perhaps, answers his own question by providing his definition of a political opportunist.

Here's the quote:

The political opportunist always lacks the courage of his, or her, convictions.  That's not necessarily because there aren't any convictions.  It's because the convictions are always subordinated to the needs of ambition and ingratiation."

Words of Relevance: Friedrich Hayek on "Social Justice"

There is a whole chapter in Roger Kimball's important book: The Fortunes of Permanence on the writings of Friedrich Hayek.  In it Kimball, before getting to Hayek's view of "weasel words," offers this:

A weasel was once said to be able to empty an egg without leaving a mark, and "social" is in this sense a "weasel word": a phonetic husk with only an echo of meaning.   

Here's a quote from Hayek on the use of "social" followed by a hyphen:  

It is..."increasingly turned into an exhortation, a sort of guide-word for rationalistic morals intended to displace traditional morals, and now increasingly supplants the word 'good' as a designation of what is morally right." 

Kimball goes on:

"Think only of the odious phrase "social justice."  What it means in practice, is de facto injustice, since it operates by enlisting the legal machinery of justice in order to support certain predetermined ends."

Words of Relevance: Owen Paterson and "The Green Blob"

That's Owen Paterson, who recently left his post as British secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs.  He was not a big favorite of the green lobby, because he never bought into their  hysteria (which made many of them very rich).  Today's quote is from a piece he wrote in The Telegraph last month (reprinted today in the Wall Street Journal).  It could be said he left his post 'not with a whimper, but a bang.'

Here's the quote:

It has been a pleasure to take on the challenges of the rural economy and environment.  However, I leave the post with great misgivings about the power and irresponsibility of - to coin a phrase - the Green Blob.

By this I mean the mutually supportive network of environmental pressure groups, renewable energy companies and some public officials who keep each other well supplied with lavish funds, scare stories and green tape.  This tangled triangle of unelected busybodies claims to have the interests of the planet and the countryside at heart, but it is increasingly clear that it is focusing on the wrong issues and doing real harm while profiting handsomely. 

Paterson's relationship with the green lobby was never cordial as can be surmised by this addendum to his above remarks:

I soon realized that the greens and their industrial and bureaucratic allies are used to getting things their own way.  I received more death threats in a few months at [the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs] than I ever did as secretary of state for Northern Ireland. 

Words of Relevance: Eric Hoffer on Israel & The Double Standard

Eric Hoffer, is quoted in today's Wall Street Journal from the biography written by Tom Bethell: "Eric Hoffer: The Longshoreman Philosopher."

The quote is from 1968, but, as is true of most memorable and insightful quotes, is as relevant today as when first uttered. Hoffer discusses the double standard with which the world has always judged Israel and the Jews.  The Journal published a fairly lengthy excerpt from Bethell's biography, but this post will highlight only that which is the most timely given the current state of affairs in the Middle East.

Here's the quote:

The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.

Others drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem.  Russia did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it.  Turkey drove out a million Greeks and Algeria a million Frenchman.  Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese - and no one says a word about refugees.

But in the case of Israel, the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees.  Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab.  Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis. 

 

Words of Relevance: ACOG & The Right of Conscience

From a post by Wesley J Smith at "First Things."

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) published an ethics-committee opinion denying its members the right of conscience against abortion:


The first important consideration in defining limits for conscientious refusal is the degree to which a refusal constitutes an imposition on patients who do not share the objector’s beliefs. One of the guiding principles in the practice of medicine is respect for patient autonomy, a principle that holds that persons should be free to choose and act without controlling constraints imposed by others. . . . Respect for autonomy has particular importance in reproductive decision making, which involves private, personal, often pivotal decisions about sexuality and childbearing.

One might be tempted to contrast the above with this quote from the original Hippocratic Oath:

"I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy. In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art."

Hippocrates, though, has fallen out of favor with our medical schools as evidenced by the removal of the above quote from the current version of the "Hippocratic Oath."  For more on the changes, go HERE:

Words of Relevance: Flannery O'Connor on "Success"

Flannery O'Connor, who has been called the most important Catholic writer of the 20th century by Fr. Robert Barron, called herself a "hillbilly Thomist."  Her short stories were considered shocking by many, but when scrutinized were found to have deep Catholic messages.  She has been quoted as describing her Catholic faith as follows: "I am a Catholic not like someone else would be a Baptist or a Methodist, but like someone else would be an atheist."

Today's quote from her summarizes her view of success, and the role it will play in the final judgment.

Here's the quote:

We are not judged by what we are basically.  We are judged by how hard we use what we have been given.  Success means nothing to the Lord."

 

Fouad Ajami (RIP) on Charismatic Leaders

Fouadi Ajami, who died this past week, was the subject of a well-earned panegyric written by Bret Stephens in today's Wall Street Journal.

Stephens asserts, in his piece about Ajami: "His genius lay in the breath of his scholarship and the quality of his human understanding."

That "human understanding" is especially manifest in Ajami's treatment of the charismatic leader, which comes through clearly in today's quote, which, according to Stephens, was made by Ajami in a piece he had written last November.

Here's the quote:

We need no pollsters to tell us of the loss of faith in Mr. Obama's policies - and, more significantly, in the man himself.  Charisma is like that.  Crowds come together and they project their needs onto an imagined redeemer.  The redeemer leaves the crowd to its imagination: For as long as the charismatic moment lasts - a year, an era - the redeemer is above and beyond judgment. 

Words of Relevance: The Church's Hate Speech

Christian Church Logic has just uploaded a new video to their website.  It was introduced by email stating:

When the Catholic Church speaks out about topical moral issues, her comments are labeled as "hate speech".  This couldn't be further from the truth.

You can view the new video by clicking on the link below.  If you still believe in absolute Truth, please click "Like" on YouTube, and forward the video to your friends.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpWx5h8A7X8

Words of Relevance: Anthony Esolen: Equality vs Excellence

Dr. Anthony Esolen wrote a piece yesterday at Crisis Magazine, entitled "How to Form a Real Conscience," in which he clearly points out the difference between equality and excellence - especially as those concepts are viewed (or should be viewed) by our youth.

Here's the quote:

The boy who really wants to learn manhood is right not to be interested in equality. What can equality give him? He wants excellence, and that means he looks to someone who sees farther than he sees, who can do more than he can, who has been through trials he has never known, and who has learned to master his passions and make them work for good and noble ends.

Words of Relevance: Karol Wojtyla: The Church and the Anti-Church

Karol Wojtyla, later Pope John Paul II, and now St. John Paul II was an extremely prescient man (no doubt inspired by the Holy Spirit), as evidenced by a quote of his delivered in 1976 at a Bicentennial talk here in the United States.  That quote (a rather long one, but read the whole thing) was discussed by Fr. C. John McCloskey a few days ago on the Blog of The Catholic Thing.  Fr. McCloskey's essay was entitled: "The Final Confrontation," and you can read the entire essay by clicking HERE.

Here's the quote:

“We are now standing in the face of the greatest historical confrontation humanity has gone through. I do not think that wide circles of American society or wide circles of the Christian community realize this fully. We are now facing the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-Church, of the Gospel versus the anti-Gospel.

“We must be prepared to undergo great trials in the not-too-distant future; trials that will require us to be ready to give up even our lives, and a total gift of self to Christ and for Christ. Through your prayers and mine, it is possible to alleviate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it. . . .How many times has the renewal of the Church been brought about in blood! It will not be different this time.” 

Words of Relevance: St Joan of Arc: Living Without Faith

Joan of Arc, "The Maid of Orleans," who, on this day in 1431, was burned at the stake at the age of nineteen, was subsequently declared a martyr in 1456, and canonized a saint in 1920, is one of the most interesting saints in the history of the Church.  You can read more about her life by clicking HERE.

Today's quote, uttered just before her being burned at the stake, manifests her deep faith in God, which she credited for her being able to lead the French to victory over the British in the Hundred Years' War.

Here's the quote:

To live without faith is more terrible than the fire, more terrible than dying young. I have nothing more to do here. Send me back to God, from whom I came.

Today is her Feast Day.

Words of Relevance: Edmund Burke on The Age of Reason

Edmund Burke, famous Irish author and statesman of the 18th century, is quoted in Russell Kirk's seminal work, The Conservative Mind: From Burke to Eliot,
on the subject of The Age of Reason. Those among us who profess to believe only in Reason, and totally ignore Faith (except for their Faith in Reason), might give some thought to the reasoning of Burke.

Here's the quote:

The Age of Reason...was in reality an Age of Ignorance.  If (as most men, since the beginning of human history, have believed) the foundation of human welfare is divine providence, then the limitation of politics and ethics to a puny “reason” is an act of folly, the refuge of a ridiculous presumption.

Kirk goes on: Precisely this blindness to the effulgence of the burning bush, this deafness to the thunder above Sinai, is what Burke proclaims to be the principal error of the French "enlightenment."

Words of Relevance: Charles E. Rice on The Homosexual Movement

Charles E. Rice, emeritus professor at the University of Notre Dame Law School (and former assistant coach of the Notre Dame Boxing Club), in his latest literary contribution provides us with today's quote, which explains in clear language just what the homosexual movement is really about.

Here's the quote:

The homosexual movement is not at all about a right of persons to be free from unjust discrimination against them and their lifestyle.  Rather, it is a totalitarian movement that demands that society and the law affirm those lifestyles not only as good but also as entitled to special privilege even to the point of abrogating millennia of moral tradition dating back to Genesis.

Words of Relevance: Malcolm Muggeridge on Believing Lies

Malcolm Muggeridge is quoted today in an essay penned by Fr. James Schall at The Catholic Thing Blog, entitled: On Really Loving the Hairless Bipeds.

Fr. Schall, discusses Robert Reilly's new book: The Gaying of America, (see previous post), in which book, the author "remarks that often we are content to lie to ourselves about what is, about what we do and hold." Reilly then quotes Malcolm Muggeridge in a passage that "pretty well sums up what the devilish mind seeks to establish in us; that is, a willingness to lie about even the most obvious truths, if they go counter to what we want."  

Here's the quote:

“People do not believe lies because they have to, but because they want to.”

Words of Relevance: Robert R. Reilly: Evil as Good

Robert R. Reilly has written a book with what will surely be treated as a controversial title: The Gaying of America.   You can read an essay on the book posted today at Crisis Magazine by Austin Ruse by clicking HERE.  Ruse explains how society has come to accept what Aristotle cautioned against, but Rousseau encouraged.

Here's the quote:

 “Anyone who chooses an evil act must present it to himself as good; otherwise, as Aristotle taught, he would be incapable of choosing it. When we rationalize, we convince ourselves that heretofore forbidden desires are permissible. In short, we assert that bad is good.” 

Words of Relevance: Aristotle on Man & Virtue

Donald Kagan, writing today at The Imaginative Conservative, quoted Aristotle in a piece entitled: Why We Should Study the History of Western Civilization.

 Kagan recommends an examination of "the older traditions of the West that came before the modern era and to take seriously the possibility that useful wisdom can be found there, especially among the Greeks who began it all.  They understood the potentiality of human beings, their limitations, and the predicament in which they live. Man is potent and important, yet he is fallible and mortal, capable of the greatest achievements and the worst crimes. He is a tragic figure, powerful but limited, with freedom to choose and act but bound by his own nature, knowing that he will never achieve perfect knowledge and understanding, justice and happiness, but determined to continue the search."  

Kagan quotes Aristotle on the necessity of man to be virtuous.  Here's the quote:

As man is the best of the animals when perfected, so he is the worst when separated from law and justice. For injustice is most dangerous when it is armed, and man, armed by nature with good sense and virtue, may use them for entirely opposite ends. Therefore, when he is without virtue man is the most unscrupulous and savage of the animals . . .

Words of Relevance: St. John Paul II Top 10 Quotes

Dr. Taylor Marshall posted the Top 10 quotes from the newly canonized Saint John Paul II on his blog today.

Here they are:

“Faith and Reason are like two wings of the human spirit by which it soars to the truth.” 

“Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and Alleluia is our song.”

“Do not be afraid. Do not be satisfied with mediocrity. Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”

“I plead with you! Never, ever give up on hope, never doubt, never tire, and never become discouraged. Be not afraid.”

“The worst prison would be a closed heart.”

“A person’s rightful due is to be treated as an object of love, not as an object for use.”

“As the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live.”

“It is the duty of every man to uphold the dignity of every woman.” 

“If He asks much of you, it is because He knows you can give much.”

“Love between man and woman cannot be built without sacrifices and self-denial.”

Words of Relevance: Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev on Secular Consciousness and Religious Values.

Today’s quote is from Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev, head of the Department of External Relations of the Russian Orthodox Church, Moscow Patriarchate, in an address at a conference in London, on February 21, 2014.

The entire address can be read HERE.

The address was posted on the website, Inside The Vatican, by Dr. Robert Moynihan.   The following is from that post.

...and what Alfeyev sees is a process of  "de-Christianization”, of the removal of Christian symbols and Christian teachings in the public and private life of the West, and of the world, which proceeds apace, year after year, decade after decade. "And today," he said, "we can hear of how in democratic Europe an airline employee was forced to remove her cross, supposedly in the name of tolerance, peace and harmony in society."

In the clearest example of the error in the currently predominate secular notions of free choice, Metropolitan Alfeyev uses the story from scripture of the  woman about to be stoned for adultery.

Here’s the quote:

When the woman caught in adultery was brought to Christ he said to those who demanded that she be stoned to death: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her." He not only did not condemn the woman but saved her from death. And yet he said to her: "Go, and sin no more" (Jn. 8: 2-11). If we are to follow the secular notions of free choice and human dignity, then the Saviour of the world ought not to have said these words but recognize her behaviour to be normal and say: "Go and continue to do the same."

Words of Relevance: Fr. George Rutler on Euphemisms

Fr. George Rutler, pastor of St. Michael's Church in New York City, posted an essay on the Blog of Crisis Magazine today, entitled Recalling Euthanasia's Legacy of Death.

In his essay, Fr. Rutler laments the passage, six days ago, by the Belgian Chamber of Deputies of "an amendment to its 2002 euthanasia law, extending its provisions to include the killing of children…"

A man watching the proceedings cried out, "Murderers," so of course he was immediately silenced for having the bad taste of calling something by its truthful name.  Fr. Rutler then takes off on the use of euphemisms, and the reason we are currently inundated with them.

Reading the essay, several of the euphemisms that should be familiar to many came to mind, for example: "A woman's right to choose," "Planned Parenthood," "Compassion and Choices," the new name for The Hemlock Society, and here in Florida, "Competitive Work Force Act," a thinly disguised title bestowed by something called "Equality Florida," an organization dedicated to forcing the acceptance of the LGBT agenda on an unaware public.

Fr. Rutler understands euphemisms more clearly than anyone as is evidenced by today's quote of the day.

Here's the quote:

A euphemism covers shame, a timid confession by syntax rather than by sacrament, for a euphemism wants approval and not absolution.

Words of Relevance: David Berlinski on Climate Change

David Berlinski, PhD, manifestly one of the most educated, and intelligent (there is a difference) men in America, sat down recently with Peter Robinson of The Hoover Institution, and expounded upon various topics, one of which was global warming or what has now become climate change.  He does not think much of the "science" of global warming or of the "scientists" proselytizing their theory (and getting government grants to do so).  His most damning quote on the subject was published at Ricochet.com, on August 26, 2013.  The quote was mentioned during the interview with Peter Robinson (on the left in the above photo), and it serves as the quote of the day today.

Here's the quote:

"Global warming?  Who knows?  Not me, for sure.  But what I do know is that climate science is and has been in the hands of intellectual mediocrities and pious charlatans."

Here's a link to a segment of the interview:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUI-YMmdOls&feature=em-uploademail

If you have 44 minutes, you can click below to watch the entire interview.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31MI5c7LYSU&feature=em-uploademail