Testimonies for the Church Volume Four : p.118
Wednesday, January 29, 2014
But all cannot be teachers of the word in the pulpit
Testimonies for the Church Volume Four : p.118
Executive Orders: Washington - Obama
Executive Orders: Washington - Obama
| Ronald Reagan | Total | 12287 - 12667 | ||
 |
I | 213 | 12287 - 12499 | |
|
II | 168 | 12500 - 12667 | |
|
||||
| George Bush | Total | 166 | 12668 - 12833 | |
|
||||
| William J. Clinton | Total | 364 | 12834 - 13197 | |
|
I | 200 | 12834 - 13033 | |
|
II | 164 | 13034 - 13197 | |
|
||||
| George W. Bush | Total | 13198 - 13488 | ||
|
I | 173 | 13198 - 13370 | |
|
II | 118 | 13371 - 13488 | |
|
||||
| Barack Obama | Total | 168 | 13489 - 13656... | |
|
I | 147 | 13489 - 13635 | |
| II | 21 | 13636 - 13656... | ||
Last Update: Data Through January 20, 2014. (through 5 years of the Obama Administration)
Citation: Gerhard Peters. "Executive Orders." The American Presidency Project. Ed. John T. Woolley and Gerhard Peters. Santa Barbara, CA. 1999-2014. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/orders.php.
Notes:
1 1789 to 1945 (Roosevelt) data includes "numbered" and "unnumbered" executive orders. 1945 (Truman) data includes only numbered executive orders including those with letter designations (ex. Executive Order 9577-A).
Data Sources:
• 1789 - 1945 (Roosevelt) data obtained from Lyn Ragsdale, "Vital Statisitcs on the Presidency: Washington to Clinton." rev. ed. (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 1998).
• 1945 (Truman) - present data compiled by Gerhard Peters, The American Presidency Project, from documents contained in the Federal Register.
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Establishment clause overview
Establishment Clause, Religion Research
First Amendment Center
Nashville, Tenn.
Friday, September 16, 2011
The first of the First Amendment’s two religion clauses reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion … .” Note that the clause is absolute. It allows no law. It is also noteworthy that the clause forbids more than the establishment of religion by the government. It forbids even laws respecting an establishment of religion. The establishment clause sets up a line of demarcation between the functions and operations of the institutions of religion and government in our society. It does so because the framers of the First Amendment recognized that when the roles of the government and religion are intertwined, the result too often has been bloodshed or oppression.
For the first 150 years of our nation’s history, there were very few occasions for the courts to interpret the establishment clause because the First Amendment had not yet been applied to the states. As written, the First Amendment applied only to Congress and the federal government. In the wake of the Civil War, however, the 14th Amendment was adopted. It reads in part that “no state shall … deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law… .” In 1947 the Supreme Court held in Everson v. Board of Education that the establishment clause is one of the “liberties” protected by the due-process clause. From that point on, all government action, whether at the federal, state, or local level, must abide by the restrictions of the establishment clause.
Establishment
There is much debate about the meaning of the term “establishment of religion.” Although judges rely on history, the framers’ other writings and prior judicial precedent, they sometimes disagree. Some, including former Chief Justice William Rehnquist, have argued that the term was intended to prohibit only the establishment of a single national church or the preference of one religious sect over another. Others believe the term prohibits the government from promoting religion in general as well as the preference of one religion over another. In the words of the Court in Everson:
“The establishment of religion clause means at least this: Neither a state nor the federal government may set up a church. Neither can pass laws that aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another. Neither can force a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion… . Neither a state or the federal government may, openly or secretly, participate in the affairs of any religious organizations or groups and vice versa. In the words of Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect ‘a wall of separation between church and state.’”
To help interpret the establishment clause, the Court uses several tests, including the Lemon, coercion, endorsement and neutrality tests.
Lemon test
The first of these tests is a three-part assessment sometimes referred to as the Lemon test. The test derives its name from the 1971 decision Lemon v. Kurtzman, in which the Court struck down a state program providing aid to religious elementary and secondary schools. Using the Lemon test, a court must first determine whether the law or government action in question has a bona fide secular purpose. This prong is based on the idea that government should only concern itself in civil matters, leaving religion to the conscience of the individual. Second, a court would ask whether the state action has the primary effect of advancing or inhibiting religion. Finally, the court would consider whether the action excessively entangles religion and government. While religion and government must interact at some points while co-existing in society, the concern here is that they do not so overlap and intertwine that people have difficulty differentiating between the two.
Although the test has come under fire from several Supreme Court justices, courts continue to use this test in most establishment-clause cases.
Lemon test redux
In its 1997 decision Agostini v. Felton, the Supreme Court modified the Lemon test. By combining the last two elements, the Court now used only the “purpose” prong and a modified version of the “effects” prong. The Court in Agostini identified three primary criteria for determining whether a government action has a primary effect of advancing religion: 1) government indoctrination, 2) defining the recipients of government benefits based on religion, and 3) excessive entanglement between government and religion.
Coercion test
Some justices propose allowing more government support for religion than the Lemon test allows. These justices support the adoption of a test outlined by Justice Anthony Kennedy in his dissent in Allegheny County v. ACLU and known as the “coercion test.” Under this test the government does not violate the establishment clause unless it (1) provides direct aid to religion in a way that would tend to establish a state church, or (2) coerces people to support or participate in religion against their will. Under such a test, the government would be permitted to erect such religious symbols as a Nativity scene standing alone in a public school or other public building at Christmas. But even the coercion test is subject to varying interpretations, as illustrated in Lee v. Weisman, the 1992 Rhode Island graduation-prayer decision in which Justices Kennedy and Antonin Scalia, applying the same test, reached different results.
Endorsement test
The endorsement test, proposed by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, asks whether a particular government action amounts to an endorsement of religion. According to O’Connor, a government action is invalid if it creates a perception in the mind of a reasonable observer that the government is either endorsing or disapproving of religion. She expressed her understanding of the establishment clause in the 1984 case of Lynch v. Donnelly, in which she states, “The Establishment Clause prohibits government from making adherence to a religion relevant in any way to a person’s standing in the political community.” Her fundamental concern was whether the particular government action conveys “a message to non-adherents that they are outsiders, not full members of the political community, and an accompanying message to adherents that they are insiders, favored members of the political community.” O’Connor’s “endorsement test” has, on occasion, been subsumed into the Lemon test. The justices have simply incorporated it into the first two prongs of Lemon by asking if the challenged government act has the purpose or effect of advancing or endorsing religion.
The endorsement test is often invoked in situations where the government is engaged in expressive activities. Therefore, situations involving such things as graduation prayers, religious signs on government property, religion in the curriculum, etc., will usually be examined in light of this test.
Neutrality
While the Court looks to the endorsement test in matters of expression, questions involving use of government funds are increasingly determined under the rubric of neutrality. Under neutrality, the government would treat religious groups the same as other similarly situated groups. This treatment allows religious schools to participate in a generally available voucher program, allows states to provide computers to both religious and public schools, and allows states to provide reading teachers to low-performing students, even if they attend a religious school. (See Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, 2002, and Mitchell v. Helms, 2000.) It also indicates that the faith-based initiatives proposed by President Bush might be found constitutional, if structured appropriately.
The concept of neutrality in establishment-clause decisions evolved through the years. Cited first as a guiding principle in Everson, neutrality meant government was neither ally nor adversary of religion. “Neutral aid” referred to the qualitative property of the aid, such as the funding going to the parent for a secular service such as busing. The rationale in Everson looked to the benefit to the parent, not to the religious school relieved of the responsibility of providing busing for its students.
Later cases recognized that all aid is in some way fungible; i.e., if a religious school receives free math texts from the state, then the money the school would have spent on secular texts can now be spent on religious material. This refocused the Court’s attention not on the kind of aid that was provided, but who received and controlled the aid. Decisions involving vocational training scholarships and providing activity-fee monies to a college religious newspaper on the same basis as other student groups showed the Court focused on the individual’s control over the funds and equal treatment between religious and non-religious groups.
In Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, the plurality decision clearly defines neutrality as evenhandedness in terms of who may receive aid. A majority of the Court continues to find direct aid to religious institutions for use in religious activities unconstitutional, but indirect aid to a religious group appears constitutional, as long as it is part of a neutrally applied program that directs the money through a parent or other third party who ultimately controls the destination of the funds.
While many find this approach intuitively fair, others are dissatisfied. Various conservative religious groups raise concerns over diminishing the special place religion has historically played in constitutional law by treating religious freedom the same as every other kind of speech or discrimination claim. Strict separationist groups argue that providing government funds to religious groups violates the consciences of taxpayers whose faith may conflict with the religious missions of some groups who are eligible to receive funding using an “even-handed” approach.
Conclusion
Although the Court’s interpretation of the establishment clause is in flux, it is likely that for the foreseeable future a majority of the justices will continue to view government neutrality toward religion as the guiding principle. Neutrality means not favoring one religion over another, not favoring religion over non-religion and vice versa.
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The Politics of HDTV in the United States
Photo (Courtesy)
http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/J0JInEBgYZ4/maxresdefault.jpg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0JInEBgYZ4
Policy Studies Journal, Vol. 22, No. 2, (213-228)
Jeffrey A. Hart
Policies adopted by the United States government between 1987 and 1993 regardinghigh definition television (HDTV) were made primarily by the Federal Communica-tions Commission (FCC). A brief effort by members of Congress and their bureaucratic and industrial allies to link HDTV to broader industrial policies was thwarted by the George Bush Administration between 1988 and 1990. The FCC's policies with respect to simulcasting and digital signals reflected the concern of that agency to protect the interests of consumers, broadcasters, and electronics manufacturers. The first two interests traditionally were protected bythe FCC, whereas the protection of electronics was somewhat unusual and was influenced by perceptions of declining United States competitiveness. In addition, United States policymaking in this area depended strongly on the framing effect of
policies adopted in Japan and Western Europe.
Introduction
The politics of high definition television (HDTV) provides a window into the world of business-government relations in a new international economic environment of intense competition among the advanced industrial nations. HDTV involves a set of advanced technologies that arise out of a growing convergence between entertainment television and digital electronics. These new technologies include new types of advanced semiconductors, high-resolution displays, and digital recording and transmission technolo-gies.
The public unveiling of working HDTV technologies by the Japanese public broadcaster NHK (Nippon Hoso Kyokai) in 1981 was a shock to the global broadcasting, television, and electronics industries. Japan appeared to be far in front of the rest of the world in what many saw as a set of critical new technologies not just for consumer electronics but for information technology in general.
In the 1960s and 1970s, there was a rapid retreat of United States firms from consumer electronics markets under intense competition from Japan. The United States consumer electronics industry was in a very weak position in the early 1980s. As a result.the United States semiconductor industry was having increased difficulty competing with the larger and more integrated Japanese electronics concerns. When the European Commu-nity reacted negatively in 1986 to a Japanese effort to have its version of HDTV technology recognized as an international standard, many Americans in information technology industries looked to the United States government to respond with special industrial policies for HDTV. Why such policies were proposed, but for the most part not adopted, in the United States is one of the questions to be addressed here.
What is HDTV?
HDTV differs from the current generation of televisions by doubling the horizontal and vertical resolution of video images, and by providing a wider screen and digital stereosound.
Wider screens and digital sound are included in the practical definition of HDTV because market studies indicated that these have strong appeal to consumers. The high Policy Studies Journal, 22:2 definition part of HDTV is more important than wider screens and digital sound technologi-cally, however, because adequate handling of high definition images requires a greater advance in technology.
Definition in television refers to the sharpness, or resolution, of the picture transmitted and received. Potential resolution is affected by the number of horizontal lines scanned onto the video screen, which is why one sees "number of lines" featured in advertisements for many new TV products. Actual vertical and horizontal resolution is measured directly using a test pattern to determine what degree of detail can be displayed on a TV monitor. Actual resolution may vary widely for monitors with the same number of scanning lines. The monitors used in TV studios, for example, display much sharper images than one can get on a TV set at home, partly because they are more expensive and
higher quality devices, but also because they are not subject to the errors and distortions introduced in the transmission of TV signals.
The two main standards families in color TV today, NTSC (the American standard) and PAL/SECAM (the European standards), have 525 and 625 scanning lines respectively.'
Another difference between the two systems is the number of fields displayed per second: in NTSC it is 59.94, in PAL/SECAM only 50. The maximum theoretical resolution of an NTSC image is 360 by 360 pixels; 2 PAL/SECAM resolution theoretically can be higher because of the greater number of scanning lines. The greater frequency of fields per secondof NTSC cuts down on various artifacts, however, such as flicker and moird effects. HDTV production cameras will have 700 or more scanning lines and HDTV images will have atheoretical resolution of at least 700 by 700 pixels. This makes the theoretical horizontal and vertical resolution of HDTV sets at least double that of NTSC or PAL/SECAM sets.
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Google!
Inc.
The Company
Google Inc. was founded in 1998 by Sergey Brin and Larry Page to make it easier to find high-quality information on the web. The company is based on three years of research in web search and data mining done by the founders in the Stanford University Computer Science Department. Google Inc.'s headquarters are located in scenic downtown Palo Alto, California.
Google Inc. is not at present a publicly traded company, and we are currently unable to speculate on whether or when our privately-held status might change.
The Name 10^100 (a gigantic number) is a googol, but we liked the spelling "Google" better. We picked the name "Google" because our goal is to make huge quantities of information available to everyone. And it sounds cool and has only six letters.
Contacts
- Business development bizdev@google.com
- For job seekers jobs@google.com
- For the press, or to notify us of new stories mentioning Google press@google.com
- For general information (but first, please see our help and "Why use Google?" pages) help@google.com
- For suggestions and comments about the website webmaster@google.com
- For general suggestions and comments comments@google.com
- To add, move, or reindex a URL URL form
- Problems with the crawler, googlebot, or to remove a URL (but first, please see our crawler FAQ) googlebot@google.com
Copyright ©1999 Google Inc.
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Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Growth and globalisation cannot cure all the world’s ills
January 27, 2014 7:33 pm
By Gideon Rachman New forms of political conflict have emerged that are resistant to traditional prescriptions
Faced with a dangerous political threat, governments the world over tend to place their faith in the same magic medicine – economic growth. When world leaders try to address the roots of terrorism, for example, they instinctively assume that prosperity and jobs must be the long-term answer. And when a regional conflict threatens to get out of control – in east Asia or the Middle East – the standard political response is to call for greater economic integration. From Europe to China, governments place their faith in economic growth as the key to political and social stability.
But just as doctors fear the emergence of superbugs that will not respond to existing drugs, so world leaders are beginning to witness the emergence of new forms of political conflict that are resistant to their traditional prescriptions – more trade and more investment, washed down with a good dose of structural reform.
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On this story
Gideon Rachman Abe and Rouhani delight Davos
Populism puts global elite on alert
Philip Stephens Tomorrow holds both riches and risk
Iran courts western oil majors at Davos
Fall in capital flows poses growth risk
On this topic
Samuel Brittan Banish ‘inequality’ from economics
Leading View Refreshing the board
Undercover Economist Casinos and consumer manipulation
Editorial Much ado about rising inequality
Gideon Rachman
The Americans are pulling back
Bullingdon bust-up
Take inspiration from Sarajevo
Gideon Rachman The US has pivoted
Three political superbugs are causing special concern. The first is the spread of conflict in the Middle East. The second is the growing rivalry between China and Japan. The third is rising inequality in the western world – and the threat of social conflict that goes with it.
Delegates at the World Economic Forum in Davos, which ended last week, are the classic believers that capitalism and globalisation are the best antidotes to conflict. This belief is so deeply ingrained that it no longer even needs to be articulated. You can just see it in the way in which a Davos audience responds to political leaders.
This year it was President Hassan Rouhani of Iran who was received with great enthusiasm, largely because he seemed more interested in trade and investment than in nuclear weapons. Mr Rouhani did not shift Iran’s position on the difficult political issues – such as Syria, Israel or nuclear weapons – in any important way. But he sent a significant signal by beginning his speech with a statement of his ambition for Iran to become one of the 10 largest economies in the world. The Iranian leader also stressed the need to improve his nation’s relations with the rest of the world in order to achieve that goal. This emphasis on economics suggested to those in the audience that President Rouhani is literally a man you could do business with.
As a result, Mr Rouhani is in the novel position, for an Iranian leader, of being regarded as a voice of reason in the Middle East. But the president’s elevated status in the eyes of the Davos crowd is also a sign of how bleak things look elsewhere in the region.
No appeal to economic rationality is likely to end the war in Syria – where both sides are fighting for survival. It is also clear that the jihadists who are flourishing in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere are unmoved by the fruits of globalisation. Unless something goes seriously wrong, they will not be showing up in Davos any time soon.
Many still hope that an improvement in the economic situation of the Middle East will assuage the economic despair on which militant Islam is assumed to flourish. Yet not all jihadists hail from poor countries or impoverished backgrounds. Some of the militants showing up in Syria have travelled from Europe. Others have come from Saudi Arabia or the Gulf states. Jihadism is a disease that does not respond well to the traditional economic drugs.
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Democracy's Road to Tyranny
Photos (Courtesy) http://voloth.geo.do/web/ipertesto/pages/fototeca_fascismo.html
MAY 01, 1988 by ERIK KUEHNELT-LEDDIHN
Dr. Kuehnelt-Leddihn is a European scholar, linguist, world traveler, and lecturer.
Plato, in his Republic, tells us that tyranny arises, as a rule, from democracy. Historically, this process has occurred in three quite different ways. Before describing these several patterns of social change, let us state precisely what we mean by “democracy.”
Pondering the question of “Who should rule,” the democrat gives his answer: “the majority of politically equal citizens, either in person or through their representatives.” In other words, equality and majority rule are the two fundamental principles of democracy. A democracy may be either liberal or illiberal.
Genuine liberalism is the answer to an entirely different question: How should government be exercised? The answer it provides is: regardless of who rules, government must be carried out in such a way that each person enjoys the greatest amount of freedom, compatible with the common good. This means that an absolute monarchy could be liberal (but hardly democratic) and a democracy could be totalitarian, illiberal, and tyrannical, with a majority brutally persecuting minorities. (We are, of course, using the term “liberal” in the globally accepted version and not in the American sense, which since the New Deal has been totally perverted.)
How could a democracy, even an initially liberal one, develop into a totalitarian tyranny? As we said in the beginning, there are three avenues of approach, and in each case the evolution would be of an “organic” nature. The tyranny would evolve from the very character of even a liberal democracy because there is, from the beginning on, a worm in the apple: freedom and equality do not mix, they practically exclude each other. Equality doesn’t exist in nature and therefore can be established only by force. He who wants geographic equality has to dynamite mountains and fill up the valleys. To get a hedge of even height one has to apply pruning shears. To achieve equal scholastic levels in a school one would have to pressure certain students into extra hard work while holding back others.
The first road to totalitarian tyranny (though by no means the most frequently used) is the overthrow by force of a liberal democracy through a revolutionary movement, as a rule a party advocating tyranny but unable to win the necessary support in free elections. The stage for such violence is set if the parties represent philosophies so different as to make dialogue and compromise impossible. Clausewitz said that wars are the continuation of diplomacy by other means, and in ideologically divided nations revolutions are truly the continuation of parliamentarism with other means. The result is the absolute rule of one “party” which, having finally achieved complete control, might still call itself a party, referring to its parliamentary past, when it still was merely a part of the diet.
A typical case is the Red October of 1917. The Bolshevik wing of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party could not win the elections in Alexander Kerenski’s democratic Russian Republic and therefore staged a coup with the help of a defeated, marauding army and navy, and in this way established a firm socialistic tyranny. Many liberal democracies are enfeebled by party strife to such an extent that revolutionary organizations can easily seize power, and sometimes the citizenry, for a time, seems happy that chaos has come to an end. In Italy the Marcia su Roma of the Fascists made them the rulers of the country. Mussolini, a socialist of old, had learned the technique of political conquest from his International Socialist friends and, not surprisingly, Fascist Italy was the second European power, after Laborite Britain (and long before the United States) to recognize the Soviet regime.
The second avenue toward totalitarian tyranny is “free elections.” It can happen that a totalitarian party with great popularity gains such momentum and so many votes that it becomes legally and democratically a country’s master. This happened in Germany in 1932 when no less than 60 per cent of the electorate voted for totalitarian despotism: for every two National Socialists there was one international socialist in the form of a Marxist Communist, and another one in the form of a somewhat less Marxist Social Democrat. Under these circum stances liberal democracy was doomed, since it had no longer a majority in the Reichstag. This development could have been halted only by a military dictatorship (as envisaged by General von Schleicher who was later murdered by the Nazis) or by a restoration of the Hohenzollerns (as planned by Bruning). Yet, within the democratic and constitutional framework, the National Socialists were bound to win.
How did the “Nazis” manage to win in this way? The answer is simple: being a mass movement striving for a parliamentary majority, they singled out unpopular minorities (the smaller, the better) and then rallied popular support against them. The National Socialist Workers’ Party was “a popular movement based on exact science” (Hitler’s words), militating against the hated few: the Jews, the nobility, the rich, the clergy, the modern artists, the “intellectuals,” categories frequently overlapping, and finally against the mentally handicapped and the Gypsies. National Socialism was the “legal revolt” of the common man against the uncommon, of the “people” (Volk) against privileged and therefore envied and hated groups. Remember that Lenin, Mussolini, and Hitler called their rule “democratic”—demokratiya po novomu, democrazia organizzata, deutsche Demokratie—but theynever dared to call it “liberal” in the worldwide (non-American) sense.
Carl Schmitt, in his 93rd year, analyzed this evolution in a famous essay entitled “The Legal World Revolution”: this sort of revolu-tion-the German Revolution of 1933-simply comes about through the ballot and can happen in any country where a party pledged to totalitarian rule gains a relative or absolute majority and thus takes over the government “democratically.” Plato gave an account of such a procedure which fits, with the fidelity of a Xerox copy, the constitutional transition in Germany: there is the “popular leader” who takes to heart the interest of the “simple people,” of the “ordinary, decent fellow” against the crafty rich. He is widely acclaimed by the many and builds up a body guard only to protect himself and, of course, the interests of the “people.”
In the Name of the People
Think of Hitler’s SA and SS and also of the tendency to apply wherever possible the prefix Volk (people): Volkswagen (people’s car), Volksempfänger (people’s radio set), des ge-sunde Volksempfinden (the healthy sentiments of the people), Volksgericht (people’s law court). Needless to say that this verbal policy continues in the “German Democratic Republic” where we see a “People’s Police,” a “People’s Army,” while Moscow’s satellite states are called “People’s Democracies.”
All this implies that in earlier times only the elites had a chance to govern and that now, at long last, the common man is the master of his destiny able to enjoy the good things in life! It matters little that the realities are quite different. A very high-ranking Soviet official recently said to a European prince: “Your ancestors exploited the people, claiming that they ruled by the Grace of God, but we are doing much better, we exploit the people in the name of the people.”
Then there is the third way in which a democracy changes into a totalitarian tyranny. The first political analyst who foresaw this hitherto-never-experienced kind of evolution was Alexis de Tocqueville. He drew an exact and frightening picture of our Provider State (wrongly called Welfare State) in the second volume of his Democracy in America, published in 1835; he spoke at length about a form of tyranny which he could only describe, but not name, because it had no historic precedent. Admittedly, it took several generations until Tocqueville’s vision became a reality.
He envisaged a democratic government in which nearly all human affairs would be regulated by a mild, “compassionate” but determined government under which the citizens would practice their pursuit of happiness as “timid animals,” losing all initiative and freedom. The Roman Emperors, he said, could direct their wrath against individuals, but control of all forms of life was out of the question under their rule. We have to add that in Tocqueville’s time the technology for such a surveillance and regulation was insufficiently developed. The computer had not been invented and thus his warnings found little echo in the past century.
Tocqueville, a genuine liberal and legitimist, had gone to America not only because he was concerned with trends in the United States, but also on account of the electoral victory of Andrew Jackson, the first Democrat in the White House and the man who introduced the highly democratic Spoils System, a genuine invitation to corruption. The Founding Fathers, as Charles Beard has pointed out, hated democracy more than Original Sin. But now a French ideology, only too familiar to Tocqueville, had started to conquer America.
This portentous development lured the French aristocrat to the New World where he wanted to observe the global advance of “democratism,” in his opinion and to his dismay bound to penetrate everywhere and to end in either anarchy or the New Tyranny—which he referred to as “democratic despotism.” The road to anarchy is more apt to be taken by South Europeans and South Americans (and it usually terminates in military dictatorships in order to prevent total dissolution), whereas the northern nations, while keeping all democratic appearances, tend to founder in totalitarian welfare bureaucracy. The lack of a common political philosophy is more conducive to the development of outright revolutions in the South where civil wars tend to be “the continuation of parliamentarism with other (and more violent) means,” while the North is rather given to evolutionary processes, to a creeping increase of slavery and a decrease of personal freedom and initiative. This process can be much more paralyzing than a mere personal dictatorship, military or otherwise, without an ideological and totalitarian character. The Franco and Salazar regimes and certain Latin American authoritarian governments, all mellowing with the years, are good examples.
Slouching Toward Servitude
Tocqueville did not tell us just how the gradual change toward totalitarian servitude can come about. But 150 years ago he could not exactly foresee that the parliamentary scene would produce two main types of parties: the Santa Claus parties, predominantly on the Left, and the Tighten-Your-Belt parties, more or less on the Right. The Santa Claus parties, with presents for the many, normally take from some people to give to others: they operate with largesses, to use the term of John Adams. Socialism, whether national or international, will act in the name of “distributive justice,” as well as “social justice” and “progress,” and thus gain popularity. You don’t, after all, shoot Santa Claus. As a result, these parties normally win elections, and politicians who use their slogans are effective vote-getters.
The Tighten-Your-Belt parties, if they unexpectedly gain power, generally act more wisely, but they rarely have the courage to undo the policies of the Santa parties. The voting masses, who frequently favor the Santa parties, would retract their support if the Tighten-Your-Belt parties were to act radically and consistently. Profligates are usually more popular than misers. In fact, the Santa Claus parties are rarely utterly defeated, but they sometimes defeat themselves by featuring hopeless candidates or causing political turmoil or economic disaster.
A politicized Saint Nicholas is a grim taskmaster. Gifts cannot be distributed without bureaucratic regulation, registration, and regimentation of the entire country. Countless strings are attached to the gifts received from “above.” The State interferes in all domains of human existence—education, health, transportation, communication, entertainment, food, commerce, industry, farming, building, employment, inheritance, social life, birth, and death.
There are two aspects to this large-scale interference: statism and egalitarianism, yet they are intrinsically connected since to regiment society perfectly, you must reduce people to an identical level. Thus, a “classless society” becomes the real aim, and every kind of discrimination must come to an end. But, discrimination is intrinsic to a free life, because freedom of will and choice is a characteristic of man and his personality. If I marry Bess instead of Jean, I obviously discriminate against Jean; if I employ Dr. Nishiyama as a teacher of Japanese instead of Dr. O’Hanrahan, I discriminate against the latter, and so forth. (One should not be surprised if an opera house that rejects a 4-foot tall Bambuti singer for the role of Siegfried in Wagner’s “Ring” is accused of racism!)
There is, in fact, only either just or unjust discrimination. Yet, egalitarian democracy remains adamant in its totalitarian policy. The popular pastime of modern democracies of punishing the diligent and thrifty, while re warding the lazy, improvident, and unthrifty, is cultivated via the State, fulfilling a demo-egali-tarian program based on a demo-totalitarian ideology.
Democratic tyranny, evolving on the sly as a slow and subtle corruption leading to total State control, is thus the third and by no means rarest road to the most modern form of slavery.
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Quotes About Tyranny
Quotes tagged as "tyranny" (showing 1-30 of 126)
“When the people fear the government there is tyranny, when the government fears the people there is liberty.”
― Thomas Jefferson
“There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
“If tyranny and oppression come to this land it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”
― James Madison
“A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.”
― Thomas Jefferson
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Monday, January 27, 2014
US bishops commend Supreme Court injunction for Little Sisters of the Poor against HHS’ contraception mandate
Published on January 27, 2014 at 1:58 AM
Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) welcomed the move by the U.S. Supreme Court, January 24, to extend an injunction granted by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, December 31, exempting the Little Sisters of the Poor and others in their lawsuit from the Department of Health and Human Services' contraception mandate while their appeal is pending.
"The bishops of the United States welcome the Court's protection of ministries like the Little Sisters whose vital work is at the heart of what it means to be Catholic," said Archbishop Kurtz.
The injunction from the Court states that if the parties before it write to the Secretary of Health and Human Services that they are non-profit organizations, that they are religious in nature, and that they object to providing the coverage required by the HHS mandate, those employers will be protected until a decision is made by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, which is currently reviewing the case.
SOURCE U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
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"Man’s relation with his God is above human legislation"...
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In that grand old document which our forefathers set forth as their bill of rights — the Declaration of Independence —they declared: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” And the Constitution guarantees, in the most explicit terms, the inviolability of conscience: “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
“The framers of the Constitution recognized the eternal principle that man’s relation with his God is above human legislation, and his rights of conscience inalienable. Reasoning was not necessary to establish this truth; we are conscious of it in our own bosoms. It is this consciousness which, in defiance of human laws, has sustained so many martyrs in tortures and flames. They felt that their duty to God was superior to human enactments, and that man could exercise no authority over their consciences. It is an inborn principle which nothing can eradicate.”
— Congressional documents (U.S.A.), serial No. 200, document No. 271.
The Great Controversy, p. 295.
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Its government has a separation of powers, so that a single person or entity is not the absolute executive, legislative, and judicial ruler
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It is interesting to note to what extent the present form of American government is a reaction to the abuses of the papacy of years gone by:
- The U.S. has a constitution that protects the rights of the minority.
- Its government is of the people, by the people, and for the people.
- All public offices are filled through either free elections or appointment by duly elected officials.
- Its government has a separation of powers, so that a single person or entity is not the absolute executive, legislative, and judicial ruler.
- The laws of the U.S. include impeachment proceedings for officials gone awry.
The very fact that after so many centuries there are still no safeguards in place to prevent the abuses of the past from occurring again gives us no assurance that Ellen White's prediction will not take place.
Excerpt from:
The Elusive Constitution
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Saturday, January 25, 2014
Remember the Sabbath to keep it Holy
Remember the Sabbath to keep it Holy - Pillars of our faith Church Choir Singing Sydney Australia
Angelico
Published on Aug 11, 2013
Pillars of our faith 3ABN Song - Remember the Sabbath
Pillars Music Company - (The microphone wouldn't turn on...)
3ABN Three Angel's Broadcasting Network 3am Church Three Angel's Messages Revelation 14:6-13
I have permission from Pillars of our Faith Company to perform their music and upload it to YouTube channel PushkaCom without making profit.
http://pushka.co/?p=68
Lyrics:
Remember the Sabbath to keep it Holy,
honour the day
That our Lord commands us to cease our toiling,
and we obey,
That we may know Him,
and learn His patient ways.
Keeping the Sabbath holy,
in all our days.
So enter His temple with high thanksgiving,
worship the Lord,
and fill up this house,
with your voices ringing,
let them be heard,
for we adore Him,
and lift our hearts in praise
keeping the Sabbath holy,
in all our days.
Remember the Sabbath to keep it Holy,
honour the day
That our Lord commands us to cease our toiling,
and we obey,
That we may know Him,
and learn His patient ways.
Keeping the Sabbath holy,
in all our days.
Canon 7D 24-105mm EF L Lens
ZOOM H4N handy recorder remote microphone redhead gunmetal grey
The Anglicized term "Sabbath" is in Hebrew Shabbath (שַׁבָּת, Strong's Concordance number 7676 as šabbāt, now usually Shabbat), meaning "day of rest"; it derives from the verb shavath (שָׁבַת, Strong's 7673 as šāvat, often shavat), defined as "desist from exertion" (often "rest" or "cease"). The word shavath was first used in the Biblical account of the seventh day of Creation (Genesis 2:2-3). Observation and remembrance of Sabbath is one of the Ten Commandments (the fourth in the original Jewish, the Eastern Orthodox, and most Protestant traditions, the third in Roman Catholic and Lutheran traditions). Most people who observe Biblical Sabbath regard it as having been instituted as a "perpetual covenant [for] the people of Israel" (Exodus 31:13-17), a sign in respect for the day during which God rested after having completed the Creation in six days (Exodus 20:8-11), and for God's deliverance from the Egyptian seven-day workweek (Deuteronomy 5:12-15); Isaiah extends the term to include even corrupted rest-day traditions (Isaiah 1:13). Sabbath desecration was originally officially punishable by death (Exodus 31:15). Observance in Hebrew Scriptures was universally from sixth-day evening to seventh-day evening (Nehemiah 13:19, cf. Leviticus 23:32) on a seven-day week. Subscribe to Pushka's PushkaCom Channel for a free stream of high quality Art videos about: Music, Anime, Video Games, Literature and various things of interest. Uploading a video or more every week.
Thanks for watching and sending messages ~ sharing life is fun times ~ ~ ★
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The Pillars of Our Faith
Chapter 50
[WRITTEN ON THE TRAIN EN ROUTE TO LYNN, MASSACHUSETTS, DECEMBER, 1890. APPEARED IN NOTEBOOK LEAFLETS, THE CHURCH, NO. 4.]
During the past fifty years of my life, I have had precious opportunities to obtain an experience. I have had an experience in the first, second, and third angels' messages. The angels are represented as flying in the midst of heaven, proclaiming to the world a message of warning, and having a direct bearing upon the people living in the last days of this earth's history. No one hears the voice of these angels, for they are a symbol to represent the people of God who are working in harmony with the universe of heaven. Men and women, enlightened by the Spirit of God and sanctified through the truth, proclaim the three messages in their order.
I have acted a part in this solemn work. Nearly all my Christian experience is interwoven with it. There are those now living who have an experience similar to my own. They have recognized the truth unfolding for this time; they have kept in step with the great Leader, the Captain of the Lord's host.
In the proclamation of the messages, every specification of prophecy has been fulfilled. Those who were privileged to act a part in proclaiming these messages have gained an experience which is of the highest value to them; and now when we are amid the perils of these last days, when voices will be heard on every side saying, "Here is Christ," "Here is truth," while the burden of many is to unsettle the foundation of our faith which has led us from the churches and from the world to stand as a peculiar people in the world, like John our testimony will be borne:
"That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; . . . that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us" (1 John 1:1-3).
I testify the things which I have seen, the things which I have heard, the things which my hands have handled of the Word of life. And this testimony I know to be of the Father and the Son. We have seen and do testify that the power of the Holy Ghost has accompanied the presentation of the truth, warning with pen and voice, and giving the messages in their order. To deny this work would be to deny the Holy Ghost, and would place us in that company who have departed from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits.
Confidence Assailed
The enemy will set everything in operation to uproot the confidence of the believers in the pillars of our faith in the messages of the past, which have placed us upon the elevated platform of eternal truth, and which have established and given character to the work. The Lord God of Israel has led out His people, unfolding to them truth of heavenly origin. His voice has been heard, and is still heard, saying, "Go forward from strength to strength, from grace to grace, from glory to glory." The work is strengthening and broadening, for the Lord God of Israel is the defense of His people.
Those who have a hold of the truth theoretically, with their finger tips as it were, who have not brought its principles into the inner sanctuary of the soul, but have kept the vital truth in the outer court, will see nothing sacred in the past history of this people which has made them what they are, and has established them as earnest, determined, missionary workers in the world.
The truth for this time is precious, but those whose hearts have not been broken by falling on the rock Christ Jesus, will not see and understand what is truth. They will accept that which pleases their ideas, and will begin to manufacture another foundation than that which is laid. They will flatter their own vanity and esteem, thinking that they are capable of removing the pillars of our faith, and replacing them with pillars they have devised.
This will continue to be as long as time shall last. Anyone who has been a close student of the Bible will see and understand the solemn position of those who are living in the closing scenes of this earth's history. They will feel their own inefficiency and weakness, and will make it their first business to have not merely a form of Godliness, but a vital connection with God. They will not dare to rest until Christ is formed within, the hope of glory. Self will die; pride will be expelled from the soul, and they will have the meekness and gentleness of Christ.-- Manuscript 28, 1890.
No New Organization
After the passing of the time, God entrusted to His faithful followers the precious principles of present truth. These principles were not given to those who had had no part in the giving of the first and second angels' messages. They were given to the workers who had had a part in the cause from the beginning.
Those who passed through these experiences are to be as firm as a rock to the principles that have made us Seventh-day Adventists. They are to be workers together with God, binding up the testimony and sealing the law among His disciples. Those who took part in the establishment of our work upon a foundation of Bible truth, those who know the waymarks that have pointed out the right path, are to be regarded as workers of the highest value. They can speak from personal experience, regarding the truths entrusted to them. These men are not to permit their faith to be changed to infidelity; they are not to permit the banner of the third angel to be taken from their hands. They are to hold the beginning of their confidence firm unto the end.
The Lord has declared that the history of the past shall be rehearsed as we enter upon the closing work. Every truth that He has given for these last days is to be proclaimed to the world. Every pillar that He has established is to be strengthened. We cannot now step off the foundation that God has established. We cannot now enter into any new organization; for this would mean apostasy from the truth.--Manuscript 129, 1905.
No Need for Fear
There is no need to doubt, to be fearful that the work will not succeed. God is at the head of the work, and He will set everything in order. If matters need adjusting at the head of the work, God will attend to that, and work to right every wrong. Let us have faith that God is going to carry the noble ship which bears the people of God safely into port.
When I voyaged from Portland, Maine, to Boston, many years ago, a storm came upon us, and the great waves dashed us to and fro. The chandeliers fell, and the trunks were rolled from side to side, like balls. The passengers were frightened, and many were screaming, waiting in expectation of death.
After awhile the pilot came on board. The captain stood near the pilot as he took the wheel, and expressed fear about the course in which the ship was directed. "Will you take the wheel?" asked the pilot. The captain was not ready to do that, for he knew that he lacked experience.
Then some of the passengers grew uneasy, and said they feared the pilot would dash them upon the rocks. "Will you take the wheel?" asked the pilot; but they knew that they could not manage the wheel.
When you think that the work is in danger, pray, "Lord, stand at the wheel. Carry us through the perplexity. Bring us safely into port." Have we not reason to believe that the Lord will bring us through triumphantly?
There are before me many who are old hands in the cause. I have known some of you for the last thirty years. Brethren, have we not seen crisis after crisis come upon the work, and has not the Lord carried us through, and wrought for the glory of His name? Can you not believe in Him? Can you not commit the cause to Him? You cannot with your finite minds understand the working of all the providences of God. Let God take care of His own work.--The Review and Herald, Sept. 20, 1892.
"My Hand is on the Wheel"
The coming of the Lord is nearer than when we first believed. What a wonderful thought it is that the great controversy is nearing its end! In the closing work we shall meet with perils that we know not how to deal with; but let us not forget that the three great powers of heaven are working, that a divine hand is on the wheel, and that God will bring His purposes to pass. He will gather from the world a people who will serve Him in righteousness.
Fearful perils are before those who bear responsibilities in the Lord's work--perils the thought of which makes me tremble. But the word comes, "My hand is on the wheel, and in My providence I will carry out the divine plan."-- The Review and Herald, May 5, 1903.
Judgments of God Abroad
Troublous times are before us. The judgments of God are abroad in the land. Calamities follow one another in rapid succession. Soon God is to rise out of His place to shake terribly the earth, and to punish the inhabitants for their iniquity. Then He will stand up in behalf of His people, and will give them His protecting care. He will throw His everlasting arms around them to shield them from all harm.--The Review and Herald, April 14, 1904.
Selected Messages Book 2, pp.387-391
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This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him
And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart,
2 And was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light.
3 And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him.
4 Then answered Peter, and said unto Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make here three tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias.
5 While he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him.
6 And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their face, and were sore afraid.
7 And Jesus came and touched them, and said, Arise, and be not afraid.
8 And when they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no man, save Jesus only.
9 And as they came down from the mountain, Jesus charged them, saying, Tell the vision to no man, until the Son of man be risen again from the dead.
10 And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elias must first come?
11 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things.
12 But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them.
13 Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist.
Matthew 17:1-13
(King James Version)
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A Firm Platform
The destiny of souls hangs upon the manner in which they are received." I was again brought down through these messages, and saw how dearly the people of God had purchased their experience. It had been obtained through much suffering and severe conflict. God had led them along step by step, until He had placed them upon a solid, immovable platform. I saw individuals approach the platform and examine the foundation. Some with rejoicing immediately stepped upon it. Others commenced to find fault with the foundation. They wished improvements made, and then the platform would be more perfect, and the people much happier. Some stepped off the platform to examine it and declared it to be laid wrong. But I saw that nearly all stood firm upon the platform and exhorted those who had stepped off to cease their complaints; for God was the Master Builder, and they were fighting against Him. They recounted the wonderful work of God, which had led them to the firm platform, and in union raised their eyes to heaven and with a loud voice glorified God. This affected some of those who had complained and left the platform, and they with humble look again stepped upon it.
I was pointed back to the proclamation of the first advent of Christ. John was sent in the spirit and power of Elijah to prepare the way of Jesus. Those who rejected the testimony of John were not benefited by the teachings of Jesus. Their opposition to the message that foretold His coming placed them where they could not readily receive the strongest evidence that He was the Messiah. Satan led on those who rejected the message of John to go still farther, to reject and crucify Christ. In doing this they placed themselves where they could not receive the blessing on the day of Pentecost, which would have taught them the way into the heavenly sanctuary. The rending of the veil of the temple showed that the Jewish sacrifices and ordinances would no longer be received. The great Sacrifice had been offered and had been accepted, and the Holy Spirit which descended on the day of Pentecost carried the minds of the disciples from the earthly sanctuary to the heavenly, where Jesus had entered by His own blood, to shed upon His disciples the benefits of His atonement. But the Jews were left in total darkness. They lost all the light which they might have had upon the plan of salvation, and still trusted in their useless sacrifices and offerings. The heavenly sanctuary had taken the place of the earthly, yet they had no knowledge of the change. Therefore they could not be benefited by the mediation of Christ in the holy place.
Many look with horror at the course of the Jews in rejecting and crucifying Christ; and as they read the history of His shameful abuse, they think they love Him, and would not have denied Him as did Peter, or crucified Him as did the Jews. But God who reads the hearts of all, has brought to the test that love for Jesus which they professed to feel. All heaven watched with the deepest interest the reception of the first angel's message. But many who professed to love Jesus, and who shed tears as they read the story of the cross, derided the good news of His coming. Instead of receiving the message with gladness, they declared it to be a delusion. They hated those who loved His appearing and shut them out of the churches. Those who rejected the first message could not be benefited by the second; neither were they benefited by the midnight cry, which was to prepare them to enter with Jesus by faith into the most holy place of the heavenly sanctuary. And by rejecting the two former messages, they have so darkened their understanding that they can see no light in the third angel's message, which shows the way into the most holy place. I saw that as the Jews crucified Jesus, so the nominal churches had crucified these messages, and therefore they have no knowledge of the way into the most holy, and they cannot be benefited by the intercession of Jesus there. Like the Jews, who offered their useless sacrifices, they offer up their useless prayers to the apartment which Jesus has left; and Satan, pleased with the deception, assumes a religious character, and leads the minds of these professed Christians to himself, working with his power, his signs and lying wonders, to fasten them in his snare. Some he deceives in one way, and some in another. He has different delusions prepared to affect different minds. Some look with horror upon one deception, while they readily receive another. Satan deceives some with Spiritualism. He also comes as an angel of light and spreads his influence over the land by means of false reformations. The churches are elated, and consider that God is working marvelously for them, when it is the work of another spirit. The excitement will die away and leave the world and the church in a worse condition than before.
I saw that God has honest children among the nominal Adventists and the fallen churches, and before the plagues shall be poured out, ministers and people will be called out from these churches and will gladly receive the truth. Satan knows this; and before the loud cry of the third angel is given, he raises an excitement in these religious bodies, that those who have rejected the truth may think that God is with them. He hopes to deceive the honest and lead them to think that God is still working for the churches. But the light will shine, and all who are honest will leave the fallen churches, and take their stand with the remnant. .
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Early Writings, p.258
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Thursday, January 23, 2014
A Different Kind Of Catholicism Grows In Latino Communities
by Marlon Bishop and
January 23, 2014 5:00 AM
Listen to the Story
Morning Edition
4 min 30 sec
Worshippers are brought to tears at the Wednesday night Charismatic prayer meetings at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church in the Bronx, New York City. Marlon Bishop/Latino USA
In the Saint Anthony of Padua Church in the Bronx, Wednesday night is prayer meeting night.
Fifty people gather in the spare assembly room for a ceremony that looks very different from a Catholic Sunday Mass.
For one thing, the service is led by a woman rather than a male priest. She preaches excitedly while a rock band of young Salvadoran immigrants backs her up.
Some people in the audience hold up their hands; others are swaying gently. There are tears in the crowd.
Suddenly, the woman stops speaking in Spanish and begins speaking in tongues.
It may sound indecipherable, but for the faithful, it's a sacred language given to them by the Holy Spirit.
Welcome To A Different Kind Of Catholicism
For members of the Charismatic Catholic movement, worship centers on establishing a personal connection with God.
According to a recent survey conducted by NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard School of Public Health, about one-third of Latino Catholics in the U.S. identify as Charismatic. For non-Latino Catholics, this number is closer to one-tenth, according to an .
Marvin Rodriguez says he joined the movement seven years ago. "It means happiness. We like to express ourselves in a different way, like applauding, laughing and joy," says Rodriguez.
There are also miraculous healings and prophesying. It's very similar to what you'd expect to see at a Pentecostal church — where the number of Latino converts is growing quickly.
An Intense Spiritual Experience
By joining the Charismatic movement, Latinos can have those kinds of intense spiritual experiences without cutting their ties with the Catholic Church.
Belinda De Los Santos says she had her first direct encounter with the Holy Spirit after becoming a carismatica. "In that moment, I laughed, I cried, I fell into the Holy Spirit," says De Los Santos.
Bronx native Johnny Torres is a former drug addict who joined the Charismatic Catholic movement 10 years ago. Growing up, his parents' more tempered style of Catholicism never really caught his interest.
Bronx native Johnny Torres says he was addicted to drugs before he found Jesus in the Charismatic Catholic movement. Marlon Bishop/Latino USA
"The first time I came over here, I started crying, my body started shaking, but I didn't know what it was," says Torres.
Charismatic Catholicism in the U.S. dates back about 50 years. Latinos are a driving force in the movement today.
The Rev. Jim Sheehan, a Charismatic priest and chaplain at Bronx Community College, says traditional Catholicism just isn't connecting with the Latinos he ministers to, especially recent immigrants who are struggling.
"I think that many of us have a distant relationship with a God of the future," says Sheehan. "Charismatics, Latinos expect God to come today — hoy día."
Despite the Charismatic movement's success in engaging Latinos, Sheehan says, some more conservative members of the Catholic Church disapprove of the healings and speaking in tongues.
A Permanent Change In Direction
Fordham University theologian Michael Lee says they'd better get used to it.
Catholics attending World Youth Day await the arrival of Pope Francis for the final Mass of his visit to Brazil, at Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro on July 28. Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty Images
"I would argue that, especially now with Pope Francis, that there's an openness to this kind of worship," says Lee. "Given the numbers of Latinos and Latinas in the country and in the future of Catholicism, I definitely think it's a way forward."
The movement's influence on the Catholic community worldwide was clearly visible during last year's World Youth Day celebrations in Brazil.
Though he was an early skeptic, Pope Francis told reporters that the movement has had a positive influence on the Catholic Church.
"I don't think that the Charismatic renewal movement merely prevents people from passing over to Pentecostal denominations," said the pope. "No, it's a service to the church herself — it renews us."
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I turned on the radio early this morning to hear the news and I heard this...
Is this a Public Service Announcement for the Roman Catholic Church USA, or what?
Arsenio.
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National Apostasy Will Be Followed by National Ruin
Headlines from (Tuesday) January 21, 2014:
Obama to meet Pope Francis at Vatican for inequality summit
• White House says encounter to focus on global poverty
• President to also meet Italian president on four-day Europe trip
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/21/obama-pope-francis-vatican-inequality-summit
When our nation, in its legislative councils, shall enact laws to bind the consciences of men in regard to their religious privileges, enforcing Sunday observance, and bringing oppressive power to bear against those who keep the seventh-day Sabbath, the law of God will, to all intents and purposes, be made void in our land, and national apostasy will be followed by national ruin.—The S.D.A. Bible Commentary 7:977 (1888).
It is at the time of the national apostasy when, acting on the policy of Satan, the rulers of the land will rank themselves on the side of the man of sin. It is then the measure of guilt is full. The national apostasy is the signal for national ruin.—Selected Messages 2:373 (1891).
Roman Catholic principles will be taken under the care and protection of the state. This national apostasy will speedily be followed by national ruin.—The Review and Herald, June 15, 1897.
When Protestant churches shall unite with the secular power to sustain a false religion, for opposing which their ancestors endured the fiercest persecution, then will the papal sabbath be enforced by the combined authority of church and state. There will be a national apostasy, which will end only in national ruin.—Evangelism, 235 (1899).
When the state shall use its power to enforce the decrees and sustain the institutions of the church—then will Protestant America have formed an image to the papacy, and there will be a national apostasy which will end only in national ruin.—The S.D.A. Bible Commentary 7:976 (1910).
- Last Day Events, pp. 133,1334.
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