We ARE the bowls of wrath – Lazar Puhalo
by Archbishop Lazar Puhalo July 28, 2021 photo above: Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the seven angels, “Go, pour out the seven bowls of God’s wrath on the earth.”–Revelation 16:1 WN: Below is a pointed finger that has humanity in the crosshairs. Immediately below is Walt Kelly’s classic cartoon […]
Hot planet summer
By MICHAEL GRUNWALD 07/30/2021 photo above: trofire.com WN: All sobering. excerpts: OPINION: TOO MUCH AND NEVER ENOUGH — During a summer of record-breaking heat waves, hideous wildfires and brutal droughts, as seas rise, storms intensify and glaciers vanish, President Joe Biden and congressional Democrats are pushing the boldest climate measures Washington has ever seen. They’re […]
Concerning Life
by David Cayley June 12, 2021 photo above and to the right (clickable): Cover of David Cayley’s new (massive) book on Ivan Illich: a brilliant critic of modernity; polyglot; priest; educator; gadfly; peripatetic nomad; (should be called) Doctor of the Church–though adamantly refused by him; saint–above all friend to an array of those who knew […]
Opinion: The Jan. 6 select committee is already exceeding all expectations
Opinion by Columnist Jennifer Rubin July 28, 2021 photo above: Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) hugs Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn on Tuesday after he testified to the House select committee hearing on regarding the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. (Pool/Reuters) [pullquote] Fox News’ decision to air segments mocking the bravery of Capitol Police […]
Beyond human endurance
By Ruby Mellen and William Neff July 28, 2021 image above: convergence.unc.edu WN: The concluding quote is ominous: “As humans, we have learned to adapt,” Tereza Cavazos [a senior researcher in the department of physical oceanography at the Ensenada Center for Scientific Research and Higher Education], said. “The problem is the cost. Some will not […]
Apocalypse Right Now
Opinion Maureen Dowd July 24, 2021 photo above: Fire consumed a home as the Sugar Fire tore through Doyle, Calif., this month.Credit…Noah Berger/Associated Press WN: As the author’s last line states: Après moi, le déluge –This is generally regarded as a nihilistic expression of indifference to whatever happens after one is gone,[2] though it may […]
The Threat of an Unvaccinated South
By Adam Harris July 22, 2021 photo above: kyma.com WN: Sadly, idiot politicians like the one mentioned in the second last paragraph (see if you can guess who!) are creating enormous smoke screens of outright lies, and thereby threaten potentially millions. For, As [Shweta Bansal, an associate professor and an infectious-disease expert at Georgetown University] […]
What were the Capitol rioters thinking on Jan. 6?
By Dan Zak and Karen Heller July 20, 2021 photo above: (Robert Carter for The Washington Post) WN: Sadly, the person guilty of First Degree Insurrection–along with a sycophantic GOP almost en masse–is not yet in the dock or jail. May his day hasten . . . Please see also: ‘Some are still suffering’: Months […]
Opinion: We are fiddling while the world burns, floods and chokes
Opinion by Eugene Robinson Columnist July 21, 2021 photo above: Pyrocumulus clouds rise above the Bootleg Fire near Klamath Falls, Ore., on July 14. (Mason Trinca for The Washington Post) WN: Indeed . . . excerpts: We are fiddling while the world burns. And floods. And chokes. And maybe even careens past some kind of […]
The Democrat blocking progressive change is beholden to big oil. Surprised?
Alex Kotch Tue 20 Jul 2021 photo above: Senator Joe Manchin, Democrat of West Virginia, chairs a Senate energy and natural resources committee hearing. Photograph: J Scott Applewhite/AP WN: One word: greed . . . excerpts: As “thousand-year” heat waves caused by the climate crisis rock the west coast and biblical floods engulf major cities, […]
How to worry about the Delta variant
By MYAH WARD 07/20/2021 image above: wrex.com WN: I have a close relative who “won’t let anybody shoot that stuff into my body!” And like the best–or worst–of religious fundamentalists, he always knows best–always only knows–from past discussions with me. Whether it is ACD (Anthropogenic Climate Disruption–ain’t happening!); people of colour (no historic wrongs to […]
Opinion: The thirsty West’s dreaded water crisis is here
Opinion by David Von Drehle Columnist photo above: Lake Mead just above the Hoover Dam in Nevada last month. (Kyle Grillot/Bloomberg) WN: As in much else of the world, water in the American South and West is more precious than gold. As the writer above indicates: Water was [always] the golden ticket, the key to […]
Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI Lectures #1, #2, #3 | Quiet Prophecy Lecture Series
WN: These are hugely helpful, wise, quietly powerful. Thanks to Gerry Ayotte who studied under Father Ron Rolheiser, and pointed me to these. Lecture #1 Lecture #2 Lecture #3
There’s a Word for What Trumpism Is Becoming
Ideas by David Frum July 13, 2021 image above: Adam Maida / The Atlantic WN: Sobering and eerily prophetic. Please also see the video below, August 5, 2021. Of it, we read: Right-wing FOX News host Tucker Carlson is broadcasting from Hungary and praising that nation’s hardline policies. We discuss what’s really going on with […]
South Africa’s riots are a warning to the world
Ishaan Tharoor July 18, 2021 photo above: A scene at Chris Hani Mall in the aftermath of the unrest in Vosloorus, Johannesburg, on July 15. (Gulshan Khan for The Washington Post) WN: Activist theologian Gustavo Gutiérrez puts the issue highlighted below simply thus: “I hope my life tries to give testimony to the message of […]
Republicans were happy to support vaccine when they could credit Trump, then went on the attack
By Community last July 17, 2021 image above: cagle.com WN: “Guns and Bibles” (see below)–but nary a drop of authentic spirituality or civility. “Love of [nonwhite] neighbour?” Not a chance! But “In god1 we trust.” What a Kraken! There is not possible the latter absent the former.–the nonwhite Jesus . . . ” Guns and […]
Tucker Carlson’s Manufactured America
By Megan Garber July 12, 2021 WN: Sick . . . Please also see an earlier piece by Timothy Karr, April 27, 2021: Tucker Carlson’s Racism: Paid for by You. We read: Racism pays in America—especially if you’re the primetime host of a cable channel that panders to the country’s sizable population of white nationalists. […]
Around the World, Excessive Corporate Power Breeds Political Repression
Inequality.org 07/17/2021 By Manuel Perez-Rocha | – an Associate Fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C., and an Associate of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. Follow him @ManuelPerezIPS WN: Lord, have mercy! excerpts: [pullquote]In the face of extractive industries’ enormous economic clout, Central Americans are facing increasing displacement and threats to their […]
Four Pinocchios for Ron Johnson’s campaign of vaccine misinformation
Fact Checker Analysis Salvador Rizzo Reporter July 16, 2021 photo above: Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) (Matt McClain/The Washington Post) WN: Speaks for itself . . . Watch too this brief video: See too: The Disinformation Dozen by the Center for Countering Digital Hate, which found that just 12 people were responsible for all anti-vaccine misinformation […]
Cartoon: Thanks, anti-vaxxers!
Mark Fiore for Daily Kos Community Friday July 16, 2021 WN: This is brilliant–but so tragic! And so richly deserved! Please click on image to view. Then there is text below. Feel like supporting my work? You can join me over on Patreon. Tucker Carlson of Fox News fame is leading the anti-vaxxer charge among the right-wing […]
‘I Alone Can Fix It’ book excerpt: The inside story of Trump’s defiance and inaction on Jan. 6
By Philip Rucker and Carol D. Leonnig July 15, 2021 WN: Sick . . . excerpts: Part two of an excerpt from “I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump’s Catastrophic Final Year.” Rucker and Leonnig will discuss this book during a Washington Post Live event on July 20. As the sun rose over Washington […]
How Tucker Carlson became the voice of White grievance
By Michael Kranish July 14, 2021 photo above: patheos.com WN: What does one do with such elite entitlement; with such endless prevarication; with such premeditated blindness/deafness? In short, with such just plain awfulness?! Mark 8:18 and John 12:38 – 41 in Jesus’ words are pointers to a response: Do you have eyes but fail to […]
Screaming into silence
By Cindy Blackstock June 30, 2021 photo above: Memorial to residential school victims outside Parliament Hill in Ottawa. (Shelby Lisk) WN: Just what will it take? . . . See too my post, December 10, 2018: Black Toronto residents 20 times more likely to be shot dead by police, study says. Just what will it […]
This entire country is haunted
By Alicia Elliott July 12, 2021 photo above: The Mohawk Institute Residential School, referred to by former students as ‘the Mush Hole’ (Photograph by Alex Jacobs-Blum) WN: This statement from the article highlighted below haunts me: These acts were done on behalf of every non-Indigenous family who proudly calls themselves Canadians, because this is what […]
“The Apocalypse Has Begun”:
by David Cayley January 2, 2016 WN: This is a highly instructive essay. There is much on my website about David Cayley’s writings. Please see as well his masterful and massive book on Ivan Illich: Ivan Illich: An Intellectual Journey. excerpts: Ivan Illich, Christ and Anti-Christ, René Girard This article was written for The Palgrave […]
An American Kingdom
By Stephanie McCrummen July 11, 2021 photo above: Mercy Culture Church in Fort Worth. (Dylan Hollingsworth for The Washington Post) WN: Oh dear! Oh dear! As my good Jesuit-trained friend Gerry Ayotte says, drawing on Tradition back to the Fathers and Mothers of the Church, God speaks loudest in the silence. In the fully choreographed […]
Signs of a Need to Hate
By Community last July 11, 2021 image above: David G. Brown / Flickr WN: The article highlighted below asks why Conservatives (not all) have such a need to hate. Sadly, Liberals (not all) evoke such a question too. The answer for puzzling Liberals according to the author is: Trump’s supporters love him, this hypothesis declares, […]
How to Love an Atheist Spouse
by Stephanie Williamson July 5, 2021 photo above: Élizabeth and Félix WN: So beautifully instructive! excerpts: [su_dropcap]F[/su_dropcap]or Christians living in a culture prone to “canceling” those with unacceptable views, Salt and Light offers a different perspective. This biography of Élisabeth Leseur and her atheist husband, Félix, is a testament to the vocation of marriage and […]
The Ascension of Bernie Sanders
Opinion Maureen Dowd July 10, 2021 photo above: Senator Bernie Sanders heading back to his office after breakfast in Burlington, Vt. Credit… Ian Thomas Jansen-Lonnquist for The New York Times WN: Go for it, Bernie! excerpts: At 79, Bernie Sanders is a man on a mission, laser-focused on a list that represents trillions of dollars […]
Pro-Impeachment Republicans Face Voters’ Wrath
By Jake Jackson July 10, 2021 WN: All so tragic! But for some comic relief: The Replacement Republican Party from MarkFiore on Vimeo. excerpts: GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Rep. Peter Meijer cites Gerald R. Ford as his inspiration these days, not because the former president held his House seat for 24 years or because his […]
The Christian Right Is in Decline, and It’s Taking America With It
Opinion Michelle Goldberg July 9, 2021 photo above: Mark Peterson/Redux WN: To the first part of the title: Amen!!!1 To the second part: Whenever Christianity “owns” a culture it becomes corrupt. British 19th-century Catholic historian Lord John Acton observed: Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, […]
Opinion: Liberal democracies are running out of time to save the rest of the planet from covid
Opinion by Robert Zoellick July 9, 2021 photo above: The first batch of vaccines from the United States arrive in Dhaka, Bangladesh on July 2. Bangladesh has received 1.25 million doses of Moderna vaccine from the U.S. government through global vaccine collaboration Covax. (Sujan/AP) WN: Great wisdom from the author of the article highlighted below. […]
Opinion: Grand Old McCarthyism
Opinion by Michael de Adder Editorial cartoonist July 9, 2021 photo above: Brilliant yet tragic! Please click on: Grand Old McCarthyism
Haiti’s fate is intertwined with the U.S.
By Ishaan Tharoor with Claire Parker Email photo above: A man speaks on the phone next to a mural in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami on July 8. (Shannon Stapleton/Reuters) WN: Haiti is a made-in-France-and-America tragedy . . . Please see Egberto Willies on this: My wife Esther and I visited there in 1991, […]
Opinion: Nikole Hannah-Jones just proved the correctness of critical race theory
Opinion by Paul Butler Contributing columnist July 8, 2021 photo above: Nikole Hannah-Jones during an interview in Brooklyn on Tuesday. (John Minchillo/AP) WN: The highlighted article is all tragically true. excerpts: Nikole Hannah-Jones, and the epic failure of the University of North Carolina to recruit the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist to its faculty, just proved the […]
The war inside the Canadian Armed Forces
By Marie-Danielle Smith July 8, 2021 illustration above: by Anna Minzhulina WN: Military. Police. Prisons.1 All are rife with abuse within. As the article states: The Canadian Armed Forces, as an institution, has a necessarily coercive culture. Leaders must have a high degree of authority and control over their subordinates in order for the military […]
Welcome to crazy town: The QAnon movement explained
By Brian Bethune July 7, 2021 photo above: mindbrews.in WN: Loony and terrifying! You will also find interesting this story by Shawn Boburg, July 7, 2021, interesting and . . . sick: From corporate America to conspiracy theory promotion: How a Minnesota man made a career out of anonymously amplifying dark plots. We learn: Turnbull’s […]
Opinion: Texas Republicans rush to guard the Alamo from the facts
Opinion by Jason Stanford July 5, 2021 photo above: The Alamo in San Antonio, seen in 2013. (Eric Gay/AP) WN: This is parable of course as well about American Exceptionalism ever since Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in the 1830s of the United States as “exceptional” . . .1 Grand irony: those most railing against “political […]
It’s All Fun and War Games at the Air Show!
photo above: The last US troop withdrawal from Vietnam occurred in 1973, after almost ten years of continuous bombings with napalm: “South Vietnam, despite the assistance of perhaps 400,000 tons of napalm dropped on its behalf, surrendered on April 30, 1975. Napalm, and with it America, had lost its first war.” (Marine Guillaume, Napalm in […]
Are Pro-Choice Catholics Worthy of Communion?
By Michael F. Pettinger June 29, 2021 photo above: Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden attend a church service before his presidential inauguration, at St. Matthews Catholic Church in Washington on Jan. 20, 2021.Tom Brenner / Reuters WN: This by a thoughtful reclaimed Catholic is very wise, irenic, challenging, compassionate, understanding. excerpts: [su_dropcap]W[/su_dropcap]hen it […]
War Criminal Donald Rumsfeld Found Dead at 88
by Phyllis Bennis July 1, 2021 photo above: Then-US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld addresses a press conference at the Pentagon on 4 May 2004, more than a month after the US invasion of Iraq (AFP/File photo) WN: Rumsfeld did monstrous evil around the world, on a scale not unlike that of World War II […]