Embracing the Moral Order – Jane Austen’s Marital Advice

Sense and Sensibility Jane Austenby Chuck Colson –
The experts have a lot of ideas about why marriages crumble. But one of my favorite answers comes from someone who gave literary marriage advice — some 200 years ago: Jane Austen.

Miss Austen had a delightfully satirical eye — an approach to life that was reflected in her novels. But as Benjamin Wiker points out in his new book, 10 Books Every Conservative Must Read, Austen, the daughter of a clergyman, also had a strong and biblical core of common sense — especially when it came to romantic relationships. Her books reflect the moral order, and celebrate marriage itself.

Wiker notes that Austen lived during the early Romantic movement. The Romantics were lived a life “defined by the passions of the moment. For them, to feel is everything.”

In her novel, Sense and Sensibility, Austen describes the inevitable consequences of this approach to life. It’s the story of two sisters, both of whom fall deeply in love. [Read more…]

Islamic Supremacism Trumps Christianity at Ground Zero

St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church
St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church
by Pamela Geller –

While New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg works in anxious haste to build the cultural obscenity that is the Ground Zero mosque, the iconic St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, which was built in 1916 and destroyed in the attack on the World Trade Center towers by Muslim terrorists, remains vanquished, unable to rebuild.

Bloomberg is lobbying for 9/11 taxpayer funds for the Islamic supremacist grifters behind the Ground Zero mosque, but St. Nicholas Church is in purgatory ten years after the worst day in modern American history.

Perhaps St. Nicholas Church should claim that it is a mosque — then Bloomberg and New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn would probably pour the cement for its foundation. [Read more…]

Obama Redefining ‘Poverty’

by David Paulin –
What does it mean to be poor in America today? For typical “poor” households — as defined by the government — it means cable television, two color television sets, and two or more cars.

As for housing, it means living in air-conditioned comfort — in decent accommodations with even more space than “average” Europeans have. (Not poor Europeans, to be sure, but “average” Europeans.) Moreover, most “poor” Americans get the medical care they need, and they eat enough — in fact, they eat too much. [Read more…]

Ten Ways Progressive Policies Harm Society’s Moral Character

Dennis Prager
Dennis Prager
by Dennis Prager –

While liberals are certain about the moral superiority of liberal policies, the truth is that those policies actually diminish a society’s moral character. Many individual liberals are fine people, but the policies they advocate tend to make a people worse. Here are 10 reasons:

1. The bigger the government, the less the citizens do for one another. If the state will take care of me and my neighbors, why should I? This is why Western Europeans, people who have lived in welfare states far longer than Americans have, give less to charity and volunteer less time to others than do Americans of the same socioeconomic status.

The greatest description of American civilization was written in the early 19th century by the Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville. One of the differences distinguishing Americans from Europeans that he most marveled at was how much Americans — through myriad associations — took care of one another. Until President Franklin Roosevelt began the seemingly inexorable movement of America toward the European welfare state — vastly expanded later by other Democratic presidents — Americans took responsibility for one another and for themselves far more than they do today. Churches, Rotary Clubs, free-loan societies and other voluntary associations were ubiquitous. As the state grew, however, all these associations declined. In Western Europe, they have virtually all disappeared. [Read more…]

Charlie Rangel’s Misunderstanding of Christ and Charity

Vineyard Parable Christianity Christby William Sullivan –
The left is desperate to coerce Americans into embracing the president’s platform of increasing taxes on the wealthy to redistribute to the downtrodden, slothful, and all those between who stand to collect. So Charlie Rangel appealed to a largely Christian nation, “What would Jesus do?”

The hypocrisy here is so obvious that it need not be discussed in detail. Suffice it to say, when and where progressives draw the line on Christian influence in legislation tends to compromise any faith they claim to have. Asking this question about the current budget debate but not about, say, the morality of tax dollars serving to mutilate and siphon unborn babies from their mothers’ wombs is suspicious to say the least. If conservatives cite Christ’s teaching to protect unborn lives from a progressive agenda that indiscriminately allows for their destruction, it is panned as the archaic ravings of crackpots. Yet when Christ is referenced as a template of charity to advance the progressives’ redistributive agenda, nothing could be more pertinent to American values. [Read more…]

Northeast Priests Reaffirm Traditional Marriage Teaching of the Orthodox Church

Traditional Marriage Orthodox Church Reaffirms – OCA Priests in NY and NJ
To The Clergy and Faithful of the Diocese of New York and New Jersey

The political and ethical current of contemporary American society has once again been agitated by the recent legislative legalization of so-called “same sex marriages” in the State of New York. While the majority of Orthodox Christians are familiar with the Church’s consistent and constant teaching about same-sex attraction and the nature of marriage, this is an opportune time to repeat the Church’s teaching so that no ambiguity exists in the minds of the faithful.

Therefore, we, the Chancellor and Deans of the Diocese of New York and New Jersey, wish to thank His Grace, Bishop Michael for his recent archpastoral letter and join him in reaffirming the teaching of the Orthodox Church in this regard. [Read more…]

Time For Once Upon A Time In America

Obama Fraud Liar Fairy Tales by Richard F. Miniter –
For many years now America has been profoundly altering its culture, reordering its economy, and shedding individual liberties in response to inventive short stories told by liberal left-wing theorists. Yet, whenever one of these stories turns out to be a fairytale, as they all invariably do, we rarely back up and repair the damage.

In part because the practical result of any one fairy tale takes a while to fall to earth and poison the drinking water and by the time it does our attention has long since been focused on marshalling the facts in the debate about some new law, regulation, ordinance, code, or international agreement demanded by those who believe the next fairy tale. Or say they do.

And as often as not, we lose because we tend to ignore the fact that the real power, in this ongoing struggle between individual freedom and those who fear and revile it lies not in the facts of the matter, but with the other foot in this two step dance: the story. [Read more…]

California Paves Way for Blatant Homosexual Promotion in Schools

Homosexual Indoctrination California SB48 Schools “It is an outrage that Governor Jerry Brown has opened the classroom door for homosexual activists to indoctrinate the minds of California’s youth, since no factual materials would be allowed to be presented,” said Rev. Louis Sheldon, chairman and founder of Traditional Values Coalition (TVC). “By signing SB 48 today, California’s classrooms, textbooks and instructional materials will all become pro-homosexual promotion tools. If parents don’t already have their children out of public schools, this should cause them to remove them.”

Senate Bill 48, authored by homosexual State Senator Mark Leno, Democrat of San Francisco, is being called the “Fair, Accountable, Inclusive, and Respectful Education Act” or FAIR Act. But there is nothing fair, accountable, inclusive or respectful about it. This bill is so far-reaching into the structure of California’s education system that it is possible its harmful effects could be never-ending.

SB 48 would amend current Education Code sections to include lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender to the list of categories to be covered in all textbooks and instructional materials. These new textbooks and instructional materials would apply to ALL subjects in curriculum and to ALL grades K-12. [Read more…]

Where Did Our Time Go? Typewriters and the Disappearance of Time

Typewriter Time Orthodox by Fr Geoffrey Korz –
The natural limits of time and season, as defined by God’s created world, began to erode with the advent of candles and indoor heating. Gaslight, then electric light, extended the boundaries of civilized waking hours well beyond dusk. Television and other unlimited forms of personal entertainment presented a hundred excuses for putting off the hour of sleep well past midnight – and we became more and more tired. …

“Whoso keepeth the commandment shall feel no evil thing: and a wise man’s heart discerneth both time and judgment.” Ecclesiastes 8:5

If you are old enough to remember using a manual typewriter, you are also old enough to appreciate the convenience of not having to use one today. [Read more…]