Communism

Death Care and the Commodification of Life

August 19, 2009August 19, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

American Thinker | James Lewis | Aug. 19, 2009

Federal “healthcare” must inevitably turn into “Death Care,” because the bureaucracy will have the sole power to determine the rules under which you and I will live and die. The bureaucrats will have a fixed pot of money, and money spent to save your life comes from the same kitty that is used to give prenatal care to some poor woman from Mexico or Bangladesh. That is what they think is moral — and this is an argument about morality above all. Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, Rahm’s brother and big advisor to Obama, considers fee-for-service medicine immoral, because it allows richer people to pay more. [Read more…]

When Does a Liberal Become a Stalinist?

August 13, 2009August 13, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

American Thinker | James Lewis | Aug. 12, 2009

The first adjective that comes to mind for “liberal” may be “touchy-feely.” The best adjective for a Stalinist might be “murderous.” That’s a pretty big difference. I would never want to mistake a well-meaning liberal for a nasty Stalinist. At the same time, I hope we don’t fail to spot any Stalinists who might be looking for mischief and pretending to be liberals. Certainly the mainstream media aren’t interested in the difference. [Read more…]

Russian Archbishop Hilarion Calls Stalin “a Monster”

August 7, 2009August 7, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

Presbyterian Outlook | Sophia Kishkovsky | Aug. 4, 2009

Comments by a senior official of the Russian Orthodox Church condemning Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, accusing him of genocide, shortly before a European security forum equated the crimes of Stalin and Hitler, have stirred heated debate in the Russian media and blogosphere.

“I think that Stalin was a spiritually-deformed monster, who created a horrific, inhuman system of ruling the country,” Archbishop Hilarion had said in a June interview with the news magazine Ekspert. “He unleashed a genocide against the people of his own country and bears personal responsibility for the death of millions of innocent people. In this respect Stalin is completely comparable to Hitler.” [Read more…]

Missions and Marxism

July 22, 2009July 22, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

FrontPage Magazine | Mark D. Tooley | July 22, 2009

During the 1980’s, United Methodist Church missionaries toiled in Nicaragua, not planting churches or winning souls, but flaking for the Sandinista experiment with Central American Marxism. Today, some of those missionaries have reemerged to agitate for Honduras’ ousted leftist President Manuel Zelaya, whom the Honduran Congress and Supreme Court, with the military, removed for attempting unconstitutionally to prolong his presidency.

Zelaya’s “overthrow was carried out in violation of Honduran law,” and “those who today control the de facto government of Honduras have no legitimate right to do so,” declared 36 United Methodist missionaries currently or previously in Latin America, in a public statement. Conspiratorially, they implored President Obama to investigate “any involvement of U.S. government-related agencies, including the International Republican Institute, in encouraging or preparing the rupture of the democratic process in Honduras.” [Read more…]

Socialist America sinking

July 20, 2009July 20, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

WND | Patrick Buchanan | July 18, 2009

After half a century of fighting encroachments upon freedom in America, journalist Garet Garrett published “The People’s Pottage.” A year later, in 1954, he died. “The People’s Pottage” opens thus:

“There are those who still think they are holding the pass against a revolution that may be coming up the road. But they are gazing in the wrong direction. The revolution is behind them. It went by in the Night of Depression, singing songs to freedom.” [Read more…]

Honduras at the Tipping Point

July 6, 2009July 6, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

Why is the U.S. not supporting the rule of law?
Wall Street Journal | Mary Anastasia O’Grady | July 6, 2009

Hundreds of emails from Hondurans flooded my in-box last week after I reported on the military’s arrest of President Manuel Zelaya, as ordered by the Supreme Court, and his subsequent banishment from the country.

Mr. Zelaya’s violations of the rule of law in recent months were numerous. But the tipping point came 10 days ago, when he led a violent mob that stormed a military base to seize and distribute Venezuelan-printed ballots for an illegal referendum. [Read more…]

No Laughing Matter – America’s Path to Marxism

July 2, 2009July 2, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

FrontPageMag | Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson | July 2, 2009

Who won the Cold War? That’s a no-brainer. The United States prevailed while the Soviet Union collapsed, and the People’s Republic of China dumped Marxism; capitalism (free markets and private property) triumphed over socialism (centrally planned markets and state-owned property); an ethos of individual rights proved to be more resilient and healthy than collectivist ideology; relatively small, democratic government clearly was demonstrated to help a society prosper far more effectively than elitist Big Government.

How ironic, then, that voices in Russia and China are mocking our current Big Government policies. Those whose countries took the tragic, impoverishing detour through Big Government hell now react with scorn and derision as we Americans charge headlong down that same path. What an amazing spectacle it must be for them to see the victor of the Cold War borrow many pages from the losers’ playbook. [Read more…]

Socialism and Secularism Suck Vitality Out of Society

May 21, 2009May 21, 2009 by Orthodox Editors

TownHall | Dennis Prager | May 12, 2009

Religion in the West raised all the great questions of life: Why are we here? Is there purpose to existence? Were we deliberately made? Is there something after death? Are morals objective or only a matter of personal preference? Do rights come from the state or from the Creator?

And religion gave positive responses: We are here because a benevolent God made us. There is, therefore, ultimate purpose to life. Good and evil are real. Death is not the end. Human rights are inherent since they come from God. And so on.

Secularism drains all this out of life. No one made us. Death is the end. We are no more significant than any other creatures. We are all the results of mere coincidence. Make up your own meaning (existentialism) because life has none. Good and evil are merely euphemisms for “I like” and “I dislike.” [Read more…]

When the Obama Backlash Comes

April 29, 2009 by editor-main

American Thinker | Jeff Lukens | Apr. 29, 2009

The contradictions between Obama’s words and actions are many. He opposes big government, and then he vastly expands it. He says he favors bipartisanship, but doesn’t practice it. He says he is against earmarks, and then signs the largest pork package in history. And that is just to name a few.

Such inconsistencies are contributing to a lack of confidence in Obama and his economic policies. The budget deficits he proposes are staggering. The trillions of dollars he wants to spend are incomprehensible. There is no evidence that stimulative government spending even works. Obama is apparently racing to remake America in a socialist mold before public sentiment turns against him. One wonders whether his political capital will run out before financial capital of the country runs out. [Read more…]

Fr. Johannes Jacobse: Paschal Message 2009

April 20, 2009December 15, 2020 by Orthodox Editors

Christ Resurrection - Pascha Orthodox by Fr. Johannes Jacobse –

Only the Gospel of Christ, the proclamation that Christ is risen from the dead, reveals that death is an enemy destroyed and exposes the nihilistic embrace of death as a lie. The grand schemes of the social engineers who are intoxicated by their own pride and contemptuous of what is good and true, will one day come to nothing. Babel will fall. But until it does, destruction and suffering prevail by their hands.

How does evil flourish? Edmund Burke answered the question this way: When good men do nothing. God enters the world through a word. The Gospel of Christ, when preached with authority and by the Spirit of God, tears down strong places. “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers in the heavenly places,” writes the Apostle Paul. Truth, spoken into the world of space and time, draws from and reveals Him who is True, and tears down the towers that men build to reach God. [Read more…]