Spain's new Citizenship Course has some seeing red
Among other things, the Citizenship class recommends girls lose their virginity before marriage, say critics. According to Libertad Digital, a popular conservative Spanish electronic news site, the Socialist’s argue that such behavior is needed to ensure girls “won’t be servants to unlimited prejudices and macho customs.”
By Robert Duncan
The Spanish government says its new Education Law will promote plurality in a modern, democratic state. The law’s critics claim it is a tool for the Socialist government to indoctrinate students.
Cardinal Antonio María Rouco Varela of Madrid has said the course “clashes with the fundamental principles of the Constitution and with the right of parents to choose their children's moral instruction."
At the heart of the controversy is an obligatory Citizenship class (Educacíon para la Ciudadanía) taught over four years, beginning with 11-year old students. The course is being introduced this September in seven provinces, with a full rollout in the nation’s 17 provinces next year. The Church says the course teaches a vision of man that is not Christian. Among other things, the Citizenship class recommends girls lose their virginity before marriage, say critics. According to Libertad Digital, a popular conservative Spanish electronic news site, the Socialist’s argue that such behavior is needed to ensure girls “won’t be servants to unlimited prejudices and macho customs.”
Fernando Larrain Bustamante of the pro-family organization SOS Familia said that educational material used in the course infringes upon the rights of parents to educate their children in questions relating to religion and morality. The course “supports abortion, premarital sex and the classic theory of class warfare. The material isn’t neutral,” said Larrain.
Other critics point out that the course teaches that there are 30 types of family units, and that the definitions of male and female are antiquated and should be replaced by the terms of gender – identified as being of seven varieties that can be freely chosen by individuals.
The course teaches that “if you don’t like one gender then you can just change for another one, just like you change clothes,” said Antonio Del Moral, a state prosecutor and critic of the course.
The Spanish Forum for the Family (Foro Español de la Familia) wants Spain’s courts to intervene and is encouraging parents to be conscientious objectors in clear defiance of the Socialist government’s stance that such status cannot be claimed. “We don’t have all the numbers, but we do know that there are around 15,000 people” who have claimed conscientious objector status, said Benigno Blanco, president of the Spanish Family Forum (Foro Español de la Familia), the same group that organized millions to protest the Socialist government’s same-sex marriage legislation in 2005.
While the government went ahead with that legislation, Blanco is optimistic in this case as he foresees a favorable court ruling. “All conscientious objection cases eventually end up in court,” with a favorable ruling, “as it is a right guaranteed by the nation’s constitution,” Blanco said.
There is another way the case could end up before the courts – testing regional versus national powers. Some regional governments ruled by the Partido Popular – such as Madrid – have said they will ignore the Socialist government and allow parents to claim conscientious objector status. In the case of Madrid, the regional government said it would accept voluntary social work as an alternative to the Citizenship course in 2008.
For its part, SOS Familia has launched a letter-writing campaign that seeks to convince the government to hold off the full application of the Education Law until 2008 – after the upcoming general elections. As Larrain explained, “We don’t think that it makes much sense to implement a new education law just months before the general elections when the opposition party has said that if they come to power they will abolish the law.” Since the launch of its campaign one month ago Larrain says on average around 2,000 letters each day are being sent to the Prime Minister’s office.
In another case, Carlos Seco Gordillo, a conscientious objector and attorney in the southern province of Andalusia, presented mid-August a petition to the regional court opposing the government’s plan in “defense of the moral liberty of our children.” Seco’s petition has since been mirrored by other concerned parents.
According to Antonio Santos, president of the Family Studies Institute (IDEFA), the Citizenship course is “an unnecessary invasion on the part of the government that encroaches on the rights and primary duties of parents in the education of their children. By imposing one, unique school of thought in the classroom, and the difficulties with which parents can express their constitutional right to be conscientious objectors, these are yet further examples of this government’s lack of democratic criteria.”
None of the pro-family organizations have received a response from the Socialist government. However, Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero insisted recently his administration’s “firm intention” to implement the Education Law ahead of elections. "No faith is above the law. Faith cannot be imposed,” Zapatero argued. “Spain is a nonconfessional state, and its principles of laicism guarantee pluralism.”
In response, Bishop Ricardo Blazquez Perez of Bilbao, and president of the Spanish bishops' conference, said “Faith is not imposed, but rather it is proposed …The State is nonconfessional so that believers and non-believers, of one faith and others, can develop the religious liberty for which we have a right.”
Archbishop Antonio Cañizares of Toledo, vice-president of the Spanish Bishops Conference, noted that “laicism also cannot be above the law,” but this isn’t the case in Spain “where laicism is being consecrated as the official religion.”
In that vein, the Spanish Catholic Church issued a statement that said the Citizenship course "implies a serious wound to the original and inalienable right of parents and schools, in collaboration with them, to choose the moral formation that they want for their children. This is a right recognized by the Spanish Constitution (article 27.3). The government cannot supplant the society as an educator of the moral conscience."
Elsewhere the statement noted that if schools lose their ideological neutrality it “will impose on whoever has chosen the Catholic religion and morality another moral formation that hasn't been chosen by them."
In response to the Church’s reaction, Gregorio Peces-Barba Martínez, a Socialist heavyweight and one of the authors of Spain’s constitution, recently wrote a scathing editorial in the nation’s most widely-read newspaper, the left-leaning El Pais. Peces-Barba warned that if the Church doesn’t stop attacking the education course, "it will be necessary to address the topic of the actions and situation of the Church and establish a new status, that puts them in their place and that respects the autonomy of the civil authority."
The government insists those who oppose the mandatory class are involved in a smear campaign.
Mercedes Cabrera, Minister of Education and Science, has said that the course forms part of a “philosophy” to educate students in the values of a varied, democratic system that is based on tolerance and dialogue. Cabrera said that those who oppose the course are “those who sadly don’t know, or are distorting,” the contents of the course. “They are creating problems where there are none,” according to Cabrera.
Those words, however, don’t faze Blanco. “I’m not a prophet, but I believe we will win this case.”
Article written for National Catholic Register -- Sept. 2007
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Robert Duncan is a journalist and ombudsman for foreign press in Spain. He is an Executive Board Member and Vice-President for the Organización de Periodismo y Comunicación Ibero-Americana, and Vice-President of the energy and telecommunications association, APSCE. He is News Editor for Spero News, and Editor-In-Chief of EnerPub and Santificarnos.
He has also been published in World Catholic News, National Catholic Register, Renew America, Lifesite.net, as well as Capital Hill Coffee House, Common Conservative, The Conservative Voice, Enter Stage Right, News By Us, Conservative Crusader, World Net Daily, Mens News Daily and others. Robert was the bureau chief for an international news agency in Madrid for many years, and was published regularly in Dow Jones Newswires, with articles appearing in The Wall Street Journal.
Nobody really cares about gay marriage in Spain
The following article was published September 06, 2005. While the numbers have since risen to a couple thousand, the general fact remains ... there has been no mad rush to get married on the part of homosexuals.
The so-called need for legalizing in Spain homosexual marriages has one big problem. Hardly anybody wanted it - that is except the politicians
By Robert Duncan
The so-called need for legalizing in Spain homosexual marriages has one big problem. Hardly anybody wanted it - that is except the politicians.
That's certainly one way to read the news this past weekend that since July 3 when the government ramrodded through its same-sex marriage legislation - arguing that thousands of gays could now be rid of discriminatory practises - only 22 couples have bothered to get married.
That's right, only 22 same-sex marriages have been performed in Spain so far this year, according to an article in La Razon, a newspaper that contacted various Spanish marriage registeries.
That same La Razon article noted, "this means that around two out of every 100 of the 10,474 homosexual couples registered in the National Statistics Institute census have decided to take this step. The proportion is even smaller is we compare it to the roughly 35,000 hetero couples that have been married in the two months since the law has came into vigor."
Whatever happened to the so-called 5 percent to 10 percent of the Spanish population that were going to benefit from this new law?
That said, there are 291 same-sex couples that have registered to get married in the coming months, according to La Razon, with the majority in Madrid, with around 150 couples having registered to get married.
And there are still legal questions. At least two judges have held off a couple of same-sex weddings over concerns the government's legislation is anti-Constitutional. They've asked the Supreme Court to take a look at the legislation.
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The so-called need for legalizing in Spain homosexual marriages has one big problem. Hardly anybody wanted it - that is except the politicians
By Robert Duncan
The so-called need for legalizing in Spain homosexual marriages has one big problem. Hardly anybody wanted it - that is except the politicians.
That's certainly one way to read the news this past weekend that since July 3 when the government ramrodded through its same-sex marriage legislation - arguing that thousands of gays could now be rid of discriminatory practises - only 22 couples have bothered to get married.
That's right, only 22 same-sex marriages have been performed in Spain so far this year, according to an article in La Razon, a newspaper that contacted various Spanish marriage registeries.
That same La Razon article noted, "this means that around two out of every 100 of the 10,474 homosexual couples registered in the National Statistics Institute census have decided to take this step. The proportion is even smaller is we compare it to the roughly 35,000 hetero couples that have been married in the two months since the law has came into vigor."
Whatever happened to the so-called 5 percent to 10 percent of the Spanish population that were going to benefit from this new law?
That said, there are 291 same-sex couples that have registered to get married in the coming months, according to La Razon, with the majority in Madrid, with around 150 couples having registered to get married.
And there are still legal questions. At least two judges have held off a couple of same-sex weddings over concerns the government's legislation is anti-Constitutional. They've asked the Supreme Court to take a look at the legislation.
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Christian webmasters: Anthony Horvath - Snt Johnny
Self-described Christian apologist and 'Snt. Johnny' webmaster Anthony Horvath explains why he's using the Internet to spread the Word
By Robert Duncan
The Internet era is opening new communication avenues - and with it an ever-increasing number of electronic missionaries. Self-described Christian apologist Anthony Horvath is one such person who is uniting a love for his faith with technology.
That said Horvath, who runs the Snt. Johnny website, starts from a pessimistic outlook toward what he believes is the current status of Christianity, and the Christian Church in general. The response, according to Horvath, is to be obedient to Peter's charge in 1 Peter 3:15 to always be ready to give the reasons for what we believe.
According to Horvath, who has a BA in pastoral ministry and is working on a Masters in Philosophy and Apologetics, the Church "is near total defeat because it has failed over the course of recent decades to present itself vigorously."
Horvath - who has worked as a religion teacher and Director for Parish Ministries at a Lutheran church in Wisconsin - says that many modern-day atheists claim to have had a Christian upbringing. And that is where the technology part of Horvath's mission meets his faith. "People aren't going to their pastors for their information anymore. They're going to the Internet. People aren't leaving the Church just because they're bored with worship styles. People want substance and don't know that we have it," he says.
A quick glance at the Snt. Johnny website shows that Horvath at least appears to be avoiding what for many are "ecumenical hangups," to instead focus his attention on what he calls "propositional terms" for determining if a person is a Christian. A person is a Christian, Horvath argues, if he believes the three "Ecumenical creeds."
"At this point, some 1.5 billion people still hold to what are called the Ecumenical creeds, the Apostles, Nicene, and Athanasian Creed. When the Lutherans disagreed with the Catholics, they called themselves something different (because their propositions in some cases varied) but they could still both be called “Christians” because both groups abided by the Ecumenical creeds," writes Horvath on his website.
While not anti-Catholic, the recent reiteration on the part of the Vatican regarding the definition of "Church" - which some Christians and press mistakenly thought the Vatican was declaring that non-Catholics were not Christians – does seem to rankle Horvath and his Lutheran background.
“There seems to be the attitude that merely belonging to the organizational framework of the Catholic Church is all that is 'required' of a person. The Scriptures really don't support that idea, and the apathy that results in many cases is completely predictable,” Horvath says, adding “But the problem isn't just in the Catholic Church. This notion that a person is 'safe' so long as they are members of some official congregation and that their soul is in jeopardy if they are not is seriously harming the Christian church.”
According to Horvath, “There are some people that have the notion that our job on the planet is to maintain the borders of the 'Church' and if possible, grow those borders. In a word, they think the goal is to win people for the Church. But in fact our job is to save those who are in eternal peril, in a word, save them for
Christ.”
Horvath also has harsh words for some churches that “focus on entertaining young people - and adults, too - as though if we just keep them entertained well enough they'll stay in the church. That just isn't the reality. Keep them entertained well enough and many will have pleasant memories about the churches they used to go to and won't like it when people make fun of the church, but they themselves will have chosen to leave the faith altogether.”
“We need to ask ourselves what we are about and really live with the implications. Curriculum should be chosen because of its substance rather than its style. There needs to be more clarity from the earliest to the oldest ages on just what the doctrines of the Church are and how they are derived from the Scriptures,” says Horvath.
In that way, Horvath argues that one of his goals is to be a wake-up call to the united body of Christians. Horvath's mission is also in a large part a result of his having toyed with atheism after years of Christian education.
Horvath explains, "First and foremost, the Church produces atheists by refusing to address the questions that young people have, but secondarily, the Church has failed to explain what it believes and why. Books like Richard Dawkins's "The God Delusion" and Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" do not become best sellers in a society that understands what Christianity is all about."
The solution, according to Horvath, is apologetics in the defence of the Christian faith. "(What) I am talking about is apologetics at a much broader scale then normally understood. It should not be left to professors or specialists, such as C.S. Lewis. It needs to be incorporated into everything we do as the Church from cradle to grave."
Horvath cites the Resurrection of Jesus as an example, "It is one thing to state that the Christian church believes that Jesus rose from the dead, as a point of dogma and doctrine. It is another to state the belief and give the reasons for maintaining that belief."
While Horvath admits there are plenty of “fine apologetic” websites already, he believes his site is different from many others as, “I focus on dealing with the individual arguments of individual non-Christians and don't usually produce material for the broader audience. But the main difference is that this site is mine.”
Furthermore, Horvath notes that by having his own platform he can engage the
the world using his own particular strengths. And while Horvath says that he has seen some people turn to Christianity, the thing to remember is that apologetics is very much 'pre-evangelism.'
"I have a real heart for the college kid looking for answers, but I think the big picture requires us to stop sending our youth out like lambs to the slaughter in the first place,” Horvath said. "The battle turns on the success or failure of the local congregations to step up to the challenge."
Click here to return to homepage
By Robert Duncan
The Internet era is opening new communication avenues - and with it an ever-increasing number of electronic missionaries. Self-described Christian apologist Anthony Horvath is one such person who is uniting a love for his faith with technology.
That said Horvath, who runs the Snt. Johnny website, starts from a pessimistic outlook toward what he believes is the current status of Christianity, and the Christian Church in general. The response, according to Horvath, is to be obedient to Peter's charge in 1 Peter 3:15 to always be ready to give the reasons for what we believe.
According to Horvath, who has a BA in pastoral ministry and is working on a Masters in Philosophy and Apologetics, the Church "is near total defeat because it has failed over the course of recent decades to present itself vigorously."
Horvath - who has worked as a religion teacher and Director for Parish Ministries at a Lutheran church in Wisconsin - says that many modern-day atheists claim to have had a Christian upbringing. And that is where the technology part of Horvath's mission meets his faith. "People aren't going to their pastors for their information anymore. They're going to the Internet. People aren't leaving the Church just because they're bored with worship styles. People want substance and don't know that we have it," he says.
A quick glance at the Snt. Johnny website shows that Horvath at least appears to be avoiding what for many are "ecumenical hangups," to instead focus his attention on what he calls "propositional terms" for determining if a person is a Christian. A person is a Christian, Horvath argues, if he believes the three "Ecumenical creeds."
"At this point, some 1.5 billion people still hold to what are called the Ecumenical creeds, the Apostles, Nicene, and Athanasian Creed. When the Lutherans disagreed with the Catholics, they called themselves something different (because their propositions in some cases varied) but they could still both be called “Christians” because both groups abided by the Ecumenical creeds," writes Horvath on his website.
While not anti-Catholic, the recent reiteration on the part of the Vatican regarding the definition of "Church" - which some Christians and press mistakenly thought the Vatican was declaring that non-Catholics were not Christians – does seem to rankle Horvath and his Lutheran background.
“There seems to be the attitude that merely belonging to the organizational framework of the Catholic Church is all that is 'required' of a person. The Scriptures really don't support that idea, and the apathy that results in many cases is completely predictable,” Horvath says, adding “But the problem isn't just in the Catholic Church. This notion that a person is 'safe' so long as they are members of some official congregation and that their soul is in jeopardy if they are not is seriously harming the Christian church.”
According to Horvath, “There are some people that have the notion that our job on the planet is to maintain the borders of the 'Church' and if possible, grow those borders. In a word, they think the goal is to win people for the Church. But in fact our job is to save those who are in eternal peril, in a word, save them for
Christ.”
Horvath also has harsh words for some churches that “focus on entertaining young people - and adults, too - as though if we just keep them entertained well enough they'll stay in the church. That just isn't the reality. Keep them entertained well enough and many will have pleasant memories about the churches they used to go to and won't like it when people make fun of the church, but they themselves will have chosen to leave the faith altogether.”
“We need to ask ourselves what we are about and really live with the implications. Curriculum should be chosen because of its substance rather than its style. There needs to be more clarity from the earliest to the oldest ages on just what the doctrines of the Church are and how they are derived from the Scriptures,” says Horvath.
In that way, Horvath argues that one of his goals is to be a wake-up call to the united body of Christians. Horvath's mission is also in a large part a result of his having toyed with atheism after years of Christian education.
Horvath explains, "First and foremost, the Church produces atheists by refusing to address the questions that young people have, but secondarily, the Church has failed to explain what it believes and why. Books like Richard Dawkins's "The God Delusion" and Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" do not become best sellers in a society that understands what Christianity is all about."
The solution, according to Horvath, is apologetics in the defence of the Christian faith. "(What) I am talking about is apologetics at a much broader scale then normally understood. It should not be left to professors or specialists, such as C.S. Lewis. It needs to be incorporated into everything we do as the Church from cradle to grave."
Horvath cites the Resurrection of Jesus as an example, "It is one thing to state that the Christian church believes that Jesus rose from the dead, as a point of dogma and doctrine. It is another to state the belief and give the reasons for maintaining that belief."
While Horvath admits there are plenty of “fine apologetic” websites already, he believes his site is different from many others as, “I focus on dealing with the individual arguments of individual non-Christians and don't usually produce material for the broader audience. But the main difference is that this site is mine.”
Furthermore, Horvath notes that by having his own platform he can engage the
the world using his own particular strengths. And while Horvath says that he has seen some people turn to Christianity, the thing to remember is that apologetics is very much 'pre-evangelism.'
"I have a real heart for the college kid looking for answers, but I think the big picture requires us to stop sending our youth out like lambs to the slaughter in the first place,” Horvath said. "The battle turns on the success or failure of the local congregations to step up to the challenge."
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Does Freemason Fetish Disguise An Anti-Catholic Bias?
By Robert Duncan
If you believe Christian J. Pinto there is a common thread that binds together Francis Bacon, Nazis, the Founding Fathers of the US, Stonehenge, the Vatican and Atlantis.
Pinto is an evangelical film director whose forte is conspiration theories. His latest film "Riddles in Stone" builds upon fairly old material that most of the founding fathers of the US were actually Free Masons. But what is new in Pinto's material is the scope with which he now casts the Free Mason web.
Using that hypothesis, the producers of the film "Riddles In Stone: Secret Architecture of Washington, DC" claim that in fact Christian posers set up a secret society within the U.S. government to foment an agenda that is moving the nation toward a one world order. The premise of "Riddles In Stone" - the second installment of the Secret Mysteries of America’s Beginning series - is that secret societies such as the Free Masons and the Rosicrucians have had a profound impact on shaping the direction "America is taking with both its domestic and foreign policies — an agenda that was so pervasive that it found its way into the very architecture of the United States Capitol, Washington, D.C."
According to the producers, "'Riddles In Stone' answers questions about how the Free Masons laid the cornerstones of the most important government buildings by conducting ceremonial rituals in remembrance of pagan gods and in anticipation of the world worshipping one god of mixed origins comprised of Jehovah, Ba al, and the Egyptian god Sirius."
While such material is not entirely new in concept, it does build upon the fantastic claim that the primary revolutionary cities of Washington, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York and Boston all align perfectly with Stonehenge - however, to find out more about that theory one has to have seen the first installment.
The producers of "Riddles In Stone" claim their film "also explores why the streets in Washington, D.C., which were designed by Free Masons, form the shape of the Free Mason compass, as well as how they nearly complete the satanic pentagram, and why it was purposely not completed .... And it raises questions about the true meaning of various pagan gods found in the artwork of the Capitol’s most important buildings."
Some Background On The People Behind The Film
"Riddles In Stone" is a product of Antiquities Research Film principals Writer/director, Christian J. Pinto along with partner and executive producer, David E. Bay.
Pinto seems to be a major fan of conspiracies.
According to Amazon reviews left by a person identifying himself as Christian J. Pinto, one gathers that he also is rabidly anti-Catholic.
Defending Dave Hunt's attack on the Catholic Church in his book "A Woman Rides the Beast: The Roman Catholic Church and the Last Days," Christian J. Pinto writes:
In another Amazon review Christian J. Pinto seems to be praising a video that exposes hidden agendas behind the Oklahoma bombing.
Christian J. Pinto is the founder of the Adullam Films ministry, with works like "Rock and Roll Sorcerers," the video credited with starting Pinto "on the road to researching Bible prophecy and the New World Order." Incidentally, the name Adullam is the name of the cave where David escaped.
But it appears that at least one initial fan of Pinto and Bay has since changed his mind.
This person's main argument is that Bay and Pinto are being too soft on the Catholic Church, and therefore they must be unwitting agents.
Click here to return to homepage
If you believe Christian J. Pinto there is a common thread that binds together Francis Bacon, Nazis, the Founding Fathers of the US, Stonehenge, the Vatican and Atlantis.
Pinto is an evangelical film director whose forte is conspiration theories. His latest film "Riddles in Stone" builds upon fairly old material that most of the founding fathers of the US were actually Free Masons. But what is new in Pinto's material is the scope with which he now casts the Free Mason web.
Using that hypothesis, the producers of the film "Riddles In Stone: Secret Architecture of Washington, DC" claim that in fact Christian posers set up a secret society within the U.S. government to foment an agenda that is moving the nation toward a one world order. The premise of "Riddles In Stone" - the second installment of the Secret Mysteries of America’s Beginning series - is that secret societies such as the Free Masons and the Rosicrucians have had a profound impact on shaping the direction "America is taking with both its domestic and foreign policies — an agenda that was so pervasive that it found its way into the very architecture of the United States Capitol, Washington, D.C."
According to the producers, "'Riddles In Stone' answers questions about how the Free Masons laid the cornerstones of the most important government buildings by conducting ceremonial rituals in remembrance of pagan gods and in anticipation of the world worshipping one god of mixed origins comprised of Jehovah, Ba al, and the Egyptian god Sirius."
While such material is not entirely new in concept, it does build upon the fantastic claim that the primary revolutionary cities of Washington, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York and Boston all align perfectly with Stonehenge - however, to find out more about that theory one has to have seen the first installment.
The producers of "Riddles In Stone" claim their film "also explores why the streets in Washington, D.C., which were designed by Free Masons, form the shape of the Free Mason compass, as well as how they nearly complete the satanic pentagram, and why it was purposely not completed .... And it raises questions about the true meaning of various pagan gods found in the artwork of the Capitol’s most important buildings."
Some Background On The People Behind The Film
"Riddles In Stone" is a product of Antiquities Research Film principals Writer/director, Christian J. Pinto along with partner and executive producer, David E. Bay.
Pinto seems to be a major fan of conspiracies.
According to Amazon reviews left by a person identifying himself as Christian J. Pinto, one gathers that he also is rabidly anti-Catholic.
Defending Dave Hunt's attack on the Catholic Church in his book "A Woman Rides the Beast: The Roman Catholic Church and the Last Days," Christian J. Pinto writes:
"This book is not harsh -- it's honest. It is not slanderous to report the historical atrocities of the Roman Catholic Church, particularly since she has never repented of them. People don't take offense when someone writes a book about the Nazis and all the horrors of the concentration camps -- but somehow, they get very offended when they learn that the Vatican was behind much (if not all) of what Hitler was doing. It is not slander to say that one of the pope's titles, "Vicarius Christi" the Vicar of Christ, is the Latin term for the Greek word: "Antichrist." This is simply a fact. It is not slander to report that the RCC supported Hitler, the concentration camps, the slaughter of one million Orthodox Serbs in Croatia, and that they helped thousands of Nazi war criminals escape Europe even after the war -- giving some of them shelter in the Vatican itself. These things are well documented, and confirmed by numerous sources -- many of which have no religious axe to grind."
In another Amazon review Christian J. Pinto seems to be praising a video that exposes hidden agendas behind the Oklahoma bombing.
Christian J. Pinto is the founder of the Adullam Films ministry, with works like "Rock and Roll Sorcerers," the video credited with starting Pinto "on the road to researching Bible prophecy and the New World Order." Incidentally, the name Adullam is the name of the cave where David escaped.
But it appears that at least one initial fan of Pinto and Bay has since changed his mind.
"Upon first glance, I was raving over this film, and would have given it an easy five stars--so I can totally understand how and why somebody would rate it that high," writes the reviewer. "However, upon second glance, and having done a little background check upon the filmmaker, David Bay, I've got some bad news for us protestant Christians: David Bay is, in my estimation, a disinformation specialist, and a possible Jesuit Temporal Coadjutor."
This person's main argument is that Bay and Pinto are being too soft on the Catholic Church, and therefore they must be unwitting agents.
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Spain's Pope Gregory XVII: A Profile Of Madness
By Robert Duncan
One could be forgiven, during the focus on the death of Pope John Paul II if they had not heard the news that a Spanish pretender to Rome had also died, and that Pope Peter II had been named.
Clemente Dominguez y Gomez (59), a Spaniard who during Holy Week died on March 22nd, named himself Pope Gregory XVII and head of the Roman Catholic Church following the death of the legitimate Pope Paul VI in 1978. This was in the wake of having received that same year what Dominguez called a personal revelation from the Virgin Mary.
Dominguez was head of one of the largest schismatic groups that had broken away from the Catholic Church following Vatican II.
He later declared Pope John Paul II an "anti-pope," stating the Vatican was controlled by Satan following the implementation of the Second Vatican Council and its heretical ecumenism. Among Dominguez´ other exploits were his beatification of Christopher Columbus and Spanish dictators Francisco Franco and Miguel Primo de Rivera, as well as the excommunication of the Spanish royal family.
Blind since the mid-1970s as a result of an automobile accident, the anti-pope Dominguez´ followers claim him as "the last true Pope of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy,” according to the prophecies of Saint Malachi. Dominguez´ Holy Palmarian Church has 150 clergy ranging from nuns to bishops and cardinals, as well as over 1,500 lay members in various parts of the world. Members of the Holy Palmarian Church are mostly non-Spaniards and include Americans, Australians, Britons, Germans and Swiss.
In 1969, Dominguez installed his followers in the southern Spanish town of Palmar de Troya, near Seville, a year after four teenaged girls claimed to have seen the Virgin Mary in a nearby field. A legitimate Catholic bishop dismissed those apparitions as illusions. The girls, now in their 50s, are now said to wish to only forget the past and to have no connection with the Palmarian Church.
But that didn't stop Dominguez, who claimed within a period of five months to have seen not only Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary, but also St. Joseph and other saints - not to mention a flock of angels dressed as Dominican friars. Dominguez always felt a special affinity for the Dominicans. Averring others observations of Dominguez´ antics, his own mother once described him as "a little touched in the head."
Following these visions, Dominguez received funds to buy the "La Alcaparrosa" ranch where the Virgin Mary was said to have appeared, and lay the foundation in 1975 for his own order "The Carmelites of the Holy Face." On January 1, 1976, nine days after founding his order, Dominguez was ordained a priest, along with Manuel Alonso Corral, Carmelo "The Dancer" Pacheco and others, by an elderly schismatic bishop from Vietnam, Pierre Martin Ngo-Dinh-Thuc.
Because of these unauthorized ordinations, Bishop Ngo-Dinh-Thuc was excommunicated, although the controversial bishop's followers claim otherwise, saying that he had a secret mandate from deceased Pope Pius XI to consecrate whomever he wished as priest or bishop. Moving quickly, BishopNg-Dinh-Thuc consecrated Dominguez as bishop on January 11, 1976.
In reference to Ng-Dinh-Thuc´s actions, the Vatican issued a statement later that year that "the Church neither now recognizes nor will recognize their ordination" by him. Ng-Dinh-Thuc also later consecrated William Kamm as bishop. Kamm has been fingered as the leader of a doomsday cult in Australia and was charged there for having illicit sexual relations with a 14-year-old girl.
These developments did nothing, however, to sway Dominguez, who had himself crowned “pope” August 15, 1978 by four “cardinals” he had selected, thus founding the “One Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, and Palmarian Church.” Money kept arriving, and a basilica church was constructed.
This also afforded him a luxurious lifestyle, allowing Dominguez to hold gastronomic feasts lasting several days and drive a luxurious black limousine as head of the Palmarian Church. But Dominguez also had struggles with his sexuality, admitting that in his youth he was a prisoner of his sexual appetites, and that he had sexual liaisons with both men and women in his church.
According to the Spanish newspaper El Mundo (and other Spanish press), Dominguez was well known under the sobriquet El Voltio in Spanish homosexual circles during the time of dictator Francisco Franco. A Web site that honors Dominguez as Pope Gregory XVII describes him as "a happy lad with certain attachments to the world and its vanities, who has the tenderest filial love towards the Blessed Virgin Mary."
In later years, Dominguez would prohibit the wearing of denim, and both men and women in the Palmarian Church were required to wear long-sleeved robes buttoned to the neck. Television, Internet, and newspapers were frowned upon. Members were not allowed to have contact with people who leave the church.
Devotees of the Palmarian Church also exhibit photos of a bloody Dominguez, said to show the stigmata, or the wounds of Jesus Christ. At one time, Dominguez is said to have bled around 16 liters of blood from a wound in his chest. The human body holds around 5 liters of blood.
Dominguez´ church underwent a schism in 2003, with around 17 bishops and 200 other followers leaving to form their own church in Malaga, Spain, which they claim is the authentic Palmarian Church. Dominguez claimed the schismatics stole 1.8 million euros. Dominguez was among various anti-popes and leaders of schismatic movements that claim that the election of popes since the Second Vatican Council in 1964 have been illegitimate.
Claiming that liturgical reforms and the ecumenism espoused by the council has vacated the traditional authority of the papacy in the Catholic Church, these groups assert that St. Peter´s throne has since been vacant, in Latin: sede vacante. Since the earlier 1960s, there have been at least one other claimant to the title of anti-Pope Gregory XVII, one of whom was a Canadian, Gaston Tremblay, alias, Fr. Jean Gregoire de la Triniti, for whom a warrant was issued for the sexual abuse of children.
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Libya: Tippling, Tires, Tripoli, Tyrants And A Tree (Part One)
By Robert Duncan
The KLM flight out of Amsterdam had all the trappings of a B-Budget film.
Besides being crowded, the flight had a bedraggled appearance that was heightened by the worn glean of the tapestry and the decidedly 70s cut-and-color of the stewardesses uniforms. Passengers looking a mini-United Nations, chatted in stunted English. And then there were the aloof well-dressed Middle Eastern gentlemen, together with a stunning mid-aged American blonde. The destination: Tripoli.
The majority of the flight’s occupants were workers headed for Libya’s rich oil fields, minus a couple of women with children in tow. "We are going to see the grandparents," said the six-year old daughter of a fashionable American-Libyan mom. At least that’s what it sounded like she said given her strong Bronx accent.
For their part, the well-dressed Middle Eastern men appeared to be businessmen and government workers. The Blonde never did say what her job was, although she appeared to know quite a few of the businessmen. Perhaps she was a U.S. Civil Servant.
Off the coast of Tunisia an intercom voice announced that alcohol would no longer be served, nor was it permitted to bring alcohol into Libya. The voice added that it was also prohibited to take pictures inside the Tripoli airport. Just prior to the plane landing the stewardess handed to all passengers miniature, modeled ceramic buildings. She said they were collectibles.
I noted that the knick-knacks normally housed something stronger than water.
"Yes," admitted the stewardess, "these are usually full of alcohol. But we cannot give them as such to passengers on this flight." As if an afterthought she added, "But people do like them as presents."
I gave my miniature three-storied model of classic 19th-Century Dutch architecture to the well-dressed Libyan gentleman beside me - who seemed to believe that his ticket also purchased the right to half of my seat - who promptly presented it to the American Blonde as a gift. Who says chivalry is dead?
Ironically, this would not be the last time that the subject of alcohol would be broached while I was in Libya. "I have never drank so much in any country as I have in Libya," said a foreign businessman. (For obvious reasons I will leave him un-named).
"At holiday time, or on weekends there is always a party in the neighborhood," he explained, "and everybody shows up with a bottle or two. The only problem is if you are out in the street and being very vocal about it. But if you are just among friends or drinking at home, there is no problem."
This businessman also claimed that he and a few European ex-patriot buddies had a going wine concern. "We buy the grapes here (in Libya). Last year we bought a machine and (imported) the cork to stop up the bottles." In case you did not catch that, this businessman claimed to be manufacturing and bottling wine in Muslim Libya.
"There are a bunch of us in on this. We made over 400 bottles of wine last year. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad," he said, and added the wine was for personal consumption or to be given as a gift. "Who knows, this year, maybe more!"
I was doubtful of this story at first. And doubtful of others I'd heard. So as any good journalist would, I double-checked my facts and had two other people verify the basics. One of those fact-checkers happened to be a European ambassador, who not only repeated key ingredients to the above conversation, but also added a few colorful details.
"The problem with your religion," the ambassador scolded a waitress at an up-scale hotel in my presence, "isn’t that it’s against alcohol because it’s (alcohol) bad, but because it doesn’t want people drunk when they pray."
If that’s the argument against alcohol, then I’m with the Muslims. That said, I also found it interesting that both the ambassador and the ex-pat businessman claimed that the Sub-Saharan ambassadors were picking up funds on the sly by smuggling alcohol into Libya.
"A bottle of Johnny Walker Red Label (whiskey) goes for $200," they both said.
But I digress. Back to the airport.
I am at a loss to explain why no photos are allowed of the airport. What touristic value there would be in such pictures - other than perhaps of a documentary nature noting the peeling paint that appeared to have once been a 1960s green-blue, undoubtedly unloaded by some unscrupulous Frenchman during the years of American embargo in the desire to rid himself of outdated paint stock. One got the feeling that they are waiting for a second embargo to repaint.
In fairness there may have been some photojournalistic value in the brand-spanking new LG air-conditioners that lined the airport’s passageways, or the men lounging around the lobbies, or the endless lines to pass through security controls and scanners or the various stalls selling tea and bitter yoghurt drinks.
That said, resisting an urge to hum "from the halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli," I passed through the controls and was ushered out of the airport to the waiting hotel mini-van.
As one might expect the landscape of Tripoli is dotted with minarets, from which there are periodic calls to prayer. Not being one to believe in statistical absolutes, and at the same time knowing that around 97% of the Libyan population is Sunni Muslim, I thought to ask my driver who the remaining 3% were. “We are all Islam,” he said.
Apparently the above-mentioned ambassador also believed in statistical absolutes: “There are no other practicing religions here in Libya.”
I got a slightly different picture from a Berber who was my guide for a couple days. “People practice (other religions) discreetly.” He added his aside as if this was a novel thing, “and the government allows it.”
My guide volunteered to prove his point by taking me to a Catholic church. “There are two Catholic churches in Tripoli,” he announced. Unfortunately, by the time I was able to drag him away from all the souvenir shops that he kept taking me to it was dark when we passed by a boarded up building that seemed to suggest basic Christian architecture.
“It is really well attended,” he assured me.
According to The CIA World Factbook, "From the earliest days of his rule following his 1969 military coup, Col. Muammar Abu Minyar al-Qadhafi has espoused his own political system, the Third Universal Theory. The system is a combination of socialism and Islam derived in part from tribal practices and is supposed to be implemented by the Libyan people themselves in a unique form of 'direct democracy.' Qadhafi has always seen himself as a revolutionary and visionary leader. "
A lot of people probably do not realize that Qadhafi is also a prolific writer, including in his portfolio that smash best seller, "The Village, The Village, The Earth, the Earth and the Suicide of the Astronaut."
According to the publishers; "Muammar Qadhafi first gained international recognition as the author of the famous Green Book, a slim text in which he outlined solutions to the political, economic and social problems besetting the modern world. First published in the late 1970s, the Green Book was widely seen by political activists worldwide as an alternative to both capitalist exploitation and bureaucratic Marxism."
"By the early 1990s Muammar Al Qadhafi had turned his attention to writing short stories with the same penetrating analysis and insights that made him a controversial revolutionary thinker."
"When Muammar Qadhafi’s collection of twelve short stories first went on sale in the Egyptian capital of Cairo, the literary centre of the Arab world, nearly 100,000 copies sold within two weeks 'The Village, The Village, The Earth, the Earth and the Suicide of the Astronaut', became an overnight sensation and has gone through a number of reprints to meet the demand of Arab readers."
Here’s a paragraph in a chapter titled, "The City."
"The city was long ago, let alone nowadays, life’s nightmare and not its pleasure as is thought. If it had been a pleasure, it would have been so planned. But the city has never been established for luxury, pleasure, or joy. Rather, the city is a scavenging multitude in which people find themselves by necessity, as no one ever comes to live in the city for pleasure, so much as for a living, greed, toil, want... and employment, which forces him to live in the city."
Eighty-six words that could have been edited down to five: "Go back to the farm."
The problem with that in Libya is that if you don’t live in the city, you probably live in the desert. Over 90 percent of the country is sand and more sand. In fact, there’s so much sand that Libya is currently working on the world’s largest water development scheme - the Great Manmade River Project - that aims to pipe water from aquifers under the Sahara desert into the coastal cities.
No word if the poet leader is working on a new name to replace the project’s current utilitarian title.
No trip to Libya would be complete without a visit to the desert. But if you are planning on going into the desert you will first need to get a “desert visa,” which is not to be mistaken for a normal visa to get you through the country’s front door, nor the worthless, plastic VISA, and American Express – which you might as well leave both at home.
Once you have a “desert visa”, the next goal is to find a guide whose rigs have rollbars and seatbelts. And above all believe the guides when they claim their drivers can drive at midnight across the desert dunes with their eyes closed. I know, because one of ours did just that.
Coming out of the desert one evening the tail-lights from one of the beat-up four-wheelers in front of us disappeared. When we got closer we discovered that the driver had driven over the top of a dune to discover the other side had shifted, creating a sharp drop. The four-wheel jeep did a somersault. The driver broke his ribs on the steering wheel. I noticed he didn’t join us on our other desert excursions.
I was able to travel four hours across the desert to the middle of nowhere to look at prehistoric rock carvings of giraffes, cows, rhinoceroses, elephants and camels. Our guides showed us some ancient graves marked by stacks of rocks. Most of the graves appeared to have been picked over by two-legged scavengers. In nearby slate infested areas, stone cutlery could be found lying in abundance. So much so, that it would suggest this is one reason why today we don’t see many elephants roaming the Libyan sands.
But my favorite memory of Libya’s desert was our group complaining because the local tour guide hadn’t met us with food at the prearranged spot. Telephone calls were made, and GSM locations exchanged. After a couple of hours, hope that the food would arrive had long since vanished. About 10 kilometers on the way back, in a large stretch of sand, there was one lone tree. In the tree’s shade were the local guide and his team. They knew the terrain better than the GSM.
I gather that part of Qadhafi´s Third Universal Theory is based on heavily investing in the Arts, or at least in the poster-board economy. Arriving in Libya I was struck by the ingenuity of these artists working with such limited material, as witnessed by the myriad headshots - many of which include portions of sayings attributed to the nation’s leading poet - and which plaster building facades. No office or hotel is complete without a dozen examples of the nation’s leader. Something tells me they aren’t all painted by his painter son, and likely successor, Saif al Islam Qadhafi, who is president of the Qadhafi International Foundation.
Actually though, if I were to choose a national icon it would be a toss-up between the countless poster portraits of Qadhafi, or that other national symbol: the "burnt-out tire resting along the roadside." In an informal survey administered on a desert highway connecting to Algeria I counted an average of 16 burnt-out tires per kilometer.
I first noticed those tires on the highway leading into Tripoli, a city that reminds me of Lima, Peru. They both share dusty coasts with fairly well paved freeways with cars stopping in the middle of traffic, or driving the wrong way.
At least I’m pretty sure they were driving the wrong way, but maybe that is they way they drive in Tripoli. Who knows, maybe we were driving the wrong way. Or maybe my vision was hazy as I blinked through the sweat pouring into my eyes because our driver noticed we were warm.
Guided by the philosophy that any breeze even if it’s from the pits of Hell was better than no breeze, he promptly closed all the van’s windows and blasted us with hot air from the vehicle’s malfunctioning air-conditioner.
The longer I stayed in Tripoli my impressions strengthened with respect to the physical twinning to that of Lima. Both cities lack grass, but have plenty of litter. They also have similar block style homes that never quite seem to be finished being built.
There is one area though where Libya has Peru beaten hands down. While both cities have teams of unemployed men standing on the street corners, in Libya this has been raised to a fine art. Clusters of men use mattresses, boxes, and dilapidated chairs to form ad hoc committees. The only thing missing is a cappala singing.
There were signs of new money flowing into Libya, judging by some of the construction projects and the spiffy new hotels going up. When I asked Libyans about these new projects, the general answer undoubtedly can be summed up by one optimistic chap’s response.
"There’s lots of work now that the Americans are coming back," in reference to improved relations with the United States and the hopes that big American oil companies will return.
When I mentioned that somebody forgot to tell that to the teams of future recording stars I saw lounging around on the street corners, my guide responded. "They are sub-Saharans."
While I did not want to disagree, I countered that not all of these men appeared to be immigrants.
"Now that there is lots of work, we have lots of "black" immigrants. This is a real problem," he replied.
If that’s true, then somebody needs to update the government’s official immigration records. As of July 2004, Libya only had around 150,000 registered non-aliens - most of who now appeared to warming corners in Tripoli.
"We are trying to control the borders, but once these people arrive here they bring crime and drugs. The blacks come here and they don’t work, they bring drugs," said my guide to end the conversation.
Racist comment aside, I was struck by the thought of how poor some of these African countries must be if Libya is now an immigrant’s paradise. In fairness though, there is a word of truth in those statements. A quick glance at the countries that border Libya - Algeria, Chad, Egypt, Niger, Sudan, and Tunisia - shows none are economic beacons. And with oil revenues pouring in, and a relatively small population of around 5.6 million spread over an area the roughly the size of Alaska, this has converted Libya into having one of the highest per capita Gross Domestic Products in Africa.
There is a sense that things could be improving and businesses are seeking to be ready when the hoped for planeloads of Americans start rolling in.
The newly opened Corintios Hotel where I stayed was elegant, spotless, and had an extremely professional staff. My Texas-sized suite also had a bathroom bigger than my children’s bedrooms back in Madrid. There was a spa, a giant swimming pool, and even loads of non-alcoholic green-bottled Beck’s beer.
I’m sure there is a story there too, but I was never able to find out more. Still, I´d like to find out who was the Beck's marketing genius behind that smooth - yet cruel - deal. A tingent taste of beer, withholding the thrill of the alcoholic buzz.
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Raising Moral Monsters
Fashions nowadays stress not only a lack of decency, but of anything finite. Materialism rules. One has to wonder if the current world understands such concepts as beauty and decency, which have been degraded and defrocked of all mystery.
By Robert Duncan
I'm tired. Tired of being bombarded by images, like the young girls in the office or shops that insist on wearing trousers that hit them below their bikini lines. It honestly seems like often there is more skin showing than cloth.
How is a fellow supposed to keep his head clear - not to mention having Holy thoughts while paying at the checkout counter. But perhaps more seriously we should be asking who are these women dressing for. Something tells me that women don't dress as if they should be "working on street corners" for other women, but instead do so for men.
Is this the result of when men debase femininity to a sexual act?
Fashions nowadays stress not only a lack of decency, but of anything finite. Materialism rules. One has to wonder if the current world understands such concepts as beauty and decency, which have been degraded and defrocked of all mystery.
I am reminded of a case a few years ago in Madrid that shocked Spaniards nationwide, and involved a young Spanish woman from a well-off family who was attending university and had a baby.
Nobody knew she was pregnant - supposedly not even her boyfriend.
According to the woman's testimony, she had the baby in the bathtub. Thinking the baby was dead she wrapped it in a plastic bag and then placed it at the bottom of her closet.
Then she went to sleep.
The next morning she went to the university as if nothing had happened.
Police expressed surprise at her lack of emotion when telling what she´d done. They also say there was plastic in the baby's mouth, as if trying to prevent it from crying, and it had abrasions.
The mother says the baby "dropped."
Coupling a lack of decency with a throw-away philosophy is dangerous. Once the line is crossed, taste becomes mistaken for pleasure. It creates moral monsters - like young women who toss babies away as if they are disposable tissues.
At what stage, one has to ask, is the complete lack of compassion and appreciation for all that is human and divine the result of changing one solitary "l" in the word "class" for an "r."
Robert Duncan is a journalist and ombudsman for foreign press in Spain. He is an Executive Board Member and Vice-President for the Organización de Periodismo y Comunicación Ibero-Americana, and Vice-President of the energy and telecommunications association, APSCE.
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Islamic Terrorism's Links To Nazi Fascism
By Robert Duncan
Folks seem to be in a quandary when asked if the terms “Islam” and “Fascists” can be used in the same sentence. Those who line-up on the naysayers' side claim any such linkage demonstrates a lack of sensitivity toward the vast majority of followers of Islam.
But despite some weak politically correct attempts, the fact is that the press for the most part is guilty of whitewashing one simple fact: There is a radical, heretical brand of Islam fostering terrorism that is indeed a by-product of Fascism and a hatred of Jews.
Shahid Nickels, a member between 1998 and 2000 of the group headed by Mohammed Atta who led the 9-11 attacks, said that "Atta's weltanschauung was based on a National Socialist way of thinking. He was convinced that 'the Jews' are determined to achieve world domination. He considered New York City to be the center of world Jewry which was, in his opinion, Enemy Number One," according to an article written by Dr. Matthias Küntzel. (1)
Atta’s peculiar “Nationalist Socialist way of thinking,” however, was far from unique. In fact, it was a seed germinating for 80 years among radical Islamists that can be traced to Hassan al-Banna, a 22-year-old school teacher who gathered discontent Muslims to found the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928/1929.
While initial growth of the Muslim Brotherhood was moderate, the organization's membership rolls - coinciding with rising anti-Semitism in Europe – by August 1938 had swelled to more than two hundred thousand members. By the end of World War II the Muslim Brotherhood had around half a million members.
"Islamism, or fascism with an Islamic face, was born with and of the Muslim Brotherhood. It proved (and improved) its fascist core convictions and practices through collaboration with the Nazis in the run-up to and during World War II. It proved it during the same period through its collaboration with the overtly fascist "Young Egypt" (Misr al-Fatah) movement, founded in October 1933 by lawyer Ahmed Hussein and modeled directly on the Hitler party, complete with paramilitary Green Shirts aping the Nazi Brown Shirts, Nazi salute and literal translations of Nazi slogans. Among its members, Young Egypt counted two promising youngsters and later presidents, Gamal Abdel Nasser and Anwar El-Sadat," so begins an Asia Times article by Marc Erikson. (2)
"The "Supreme Guide" of the brethren knew that faith, good works and numbers alone do not a political victory make. Thus, modeled on Mussolini's blackshirts (al-Banna much admired "Il Duce" and soul brother "Fuehrer" Adolf Hitler), he set up a paramilitary wing (slogan: "action, obedience, silence", quite superior to the blackshirts' "believe, obey, fight") and a "secret apparatus" (al-jihaz al-sirri) and intelligence arm of al-Ikhwan to handle the dirtier side - terrorist attacks, assassinations, and so on - of the struggle for power," writes Erikson elsewhere. (3)
According to John Loftus, a former prosecutor with the US Justice Department, "Al-Banna formed this nationalist group called the Muslim Brotherhood. Al-Banna was a devout admirer of Adolf Hitler and wrote to him frequently."
Loftus adds that Al-Banna was so persistent in his "admiration of the new Nazi Party that in the 1930s Al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood became a secret arm of Nazi Intelligence. With the goal of the Third Reich to develop the Muslim Brotherhood as an army inside Egypt.” (4)
So what was Al-Banna teaching?
Well, for one thing Al-Banna idealized death.
"To a nation that perfects the industry of death and which knows how to die nobly, God gives proud life in this world and eternal grace in the life to come" and "We are not afraid of death, we desire it... Let us die in redemption for Muslims," Al-Banna once wrote.
The Muslim Brotherhood also "used and disseminated a quotation from the Koran that Jews are to be considered 'the worst enemy of the believers.' In addition, they evoked old stories of the early history of Islam by pointing to the example set by Mohammed who, as legend has it, succeeded not only in expelling two Jewish tribes from Medina during the 7th century, but killed the entire male population of the third tribe and sold all the women and children into slavery." (5)
Spreading their hate-filled message toward Jews, the Muslim Brotherhood found a soul-mate in Amin el-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem who held the highest political and religious posts in Palestine from 1921 until after World War II.
Loftus and other authors note that the Muslim Brotherhood and Mufti had common goals with the new Nazi doctrines: a hatred for Western culture, democracy and Jews.
The Mufti with the Muslim Brotherhood and Nazi ideology was a dangerous cocktail.
"As early as 1929, a Mufti-led pogrom killed 133 autochthonous Jews in Jerusalem and Hebron. Shortly thereafter, the Mufti declared the relentless fight against the Jews as the most important responsibility of all believers. Those who dared to resist his anti-Jewish orders were publicly denounced and publicly threatened in the mosques during Friday prayers." (6)
"In a letter to Adolf Hitler, the Mufti emphasized his unflagging and successful efforts to use the "the Palestine question'' in order 'to coalesce all Arab countries in a common hatred against the British and the Jews.'" (7)
Starting in 1933, the Mufti repeatedly offered to serve the German Nazi government. In the beginning, however, the Mufti's fight against Jews was only supported in terms of ideology. That soon, however, changed.
The Palestine’s 1936 "Arab Revolt" was in a large part incited by the Mufti, with cries of "Down with the Jews!" and "Jews get out of Egypt and Palestine!"
It was not until 1937 that the Mufti's "Holy War" began to receive substantial financial support and weapons from Nazi Germany, which allowed Hitler's Islamist agents both in Palestine and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt to spread their anti-Jewish hatred.
Klaus Gensicke writes in his dissertation on the Mufti's collaboration with the Nazis: "The Mufti himself admitted that it was entirely due to the money contributed by the Germans that allowed him at that time to carry out the uprising in Palestine."
“The Mufti's so-called "Arab Revolt" took place against the background of the swastika: Arab leaflets and signs on walls were prominently marked with this Nazi symbol; the youth organization of the Mufti´s political party paraded as "Nazi-scouts", and Arab children greeted each other with the Nazi salute. Those who had to pass through the rebellious quarters of Palestine attached a flag bearing the swastika to their vehicles so as to insure protection against assaults by the Mufti's volunteers.” (8)
By 1945 the Nazi Islamist agents were openly spreading terror. “The core of anti-Semitism had thus begun to shift from Germany to the Arab world. On the anniversary of the Balfour-declaration, demonstrators rampaged the Jewish quarters of Cairo. They plundered houses and shops, attacked non-Muslims, devastated the synagogues and then set them on fire. Six people were killed, several hundred more were injured.” (9)
Al-Husseini, wrote in his post-WWII memoirs, "Our fundamental condition for cooperating with Germany was a free hand to eradicate every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world. I asked Hitler for an explicit undertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish problem in a manner befitting our national and racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods innovated by Germany in the handling of its Jews. The answer I got was: 'The Jews are yours.'" (10)
According to an article by David Storobin in Front Page magazine, "Controlling a spectacular sum of money and the right to appoint Palestinian Islamic preachers, al-Husseini built a ‘political machine’ that brought the religious and political establishment under his domination. Through them, he was able to arouse religious fanaticism against Jews and the West. His preachers urged their flock to ‘go out and murder the Jewish infidel in the name of the holy Koran,’ constantly declaring that ‘he who kills a Jew is assured of a place in the next world.’” (11)
Dr. Matthias Küntzel quotes Klaus Gensicke who claims that "The Mufti himself admitted that it was entirely due to the money contributed by the Germans that allowed him at that time to carry out the uprising in Palestine." (12)
Storobin notes that al-Husseini was, “officially received by Adolf Hitler on November 28, 1941, who agreed to establish a bureau for al-Husseini which was used to spread propaganda on behalf of Nazi Germany, organize spy rings in Europe and the Middle East, and most importantly, establish Muslim Nazi SS divisions and Wehrmacht units in Bosnia, the Balkans, North Africa and Nazi-occupied parts of the Soviet Union. After the meeting, the Mufti was also named SS Gruppenfuehrer by Heinrich Himmler and referred to as the “Fuhrer of the Arab World” by Adolf Hitler himself.”
”The largest Muslim Nazi SS unit was the 13th division known as “Hanjar.” Husseini also organized smaller, less efficient units, including the 21st Waffen SS division known Skanderbeg (made up predominantly of Croatians) and the 23rd Waffen SS division known as Kama and made up mostly of Albanian Muslims. Thus, the Hitler’s Mufti organized or helped to organize three out of 27 Waffen SS divisions formed before 1945.” (13)
Loftus too claims that the Mufti “went to Germany during the war and helped recruit an international SS division of Arab Nazis. They based it in Croatia and called it the Handzar Muslim Division, but it was to become the core of Hitler's new army of Arab fascists that would conquer the Arabian Peninsula and, from there, on to Africa—grand dreams." (14)
According to Küntzel, "The powerful collaboration of the Muslim Brothers with the Mufti and the pogroms against Jews a few months after the world learned about Auschwitz clearly showed that the Brotherhood either ignored or even justified Hitler´s extermination of European Jews."
Küntzel telling writes that "The consequences of this attitude, however, continue to be far-reaching and characterize the Arabic-Jewish conflict to this day." (15) Küntzel notes that this group of Islamists in 1947 explained away the international support of the creation of Israel and the murder of six million European Jews by Nazi Germany, by reverting to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.
In this vein, the Muslim Brotherhood considered the UN-decision of 1947 to partition Palestine to be an "international plot carried out by the Americans, the Russians and the British, under the influence of Zionism," (16) Küntzel noted. (17)
Not surprisingly, given their role in WWII, the Muslim Brotherhood was wanted for War Crimes. However, instead of being brought to justice the Arab Nazis were snapped up by foreign spy agencies.
Specifically, John Loftus claims that, almost the entire network was taken in by the British Secret Service. “Then a horrible thing happened. Instead of prosecuting the Nazis—the Muslim Brotherhood—the British Government hired them. They brought all the fugitive Nazi war criminals of Arab and Muslim descent into Egypt, and for three years trained them on a special mission. The British Secret Service wanted to use the fascists of the Muslim Brotherhood to strike down the infant state of Israel in 1948. Only a few people in the Mossad know this, but many of the members of the Arab armies and terrorist groups that tried to strangle the infant State of Israel were the Arab Nazis of the Muslim Brotherhood.”
”Britain was not alone. The French Intelligence Service cooperated by releasing the Grand Mufti and smuggling him to Egypt, so all of the Arab Nazis came together. So, from 1945 to 1948, the British Secret Service protected every Arab Nazi it could, but failed to quash the State of Israel”, according to Loftus. (18)
Despite being now on side of the Allies, the Brotherhood didn’t sit still – nor did their ideology get any tamer.
One of the main voices behind the Muslim Brotherhood was Sayed Qutb. With time, Qutb would eventually become the organization’s ambassador in the 1950s in Syria and Jordon, as well as being the editor of the Brotherhood’s official publication. While in prison following an assassination attempt on Egypt’s Nasser, Qutb wrote his treatise, Milestones, that advocated overthrowing Arab governments that refused to be run by anything other than the law of Islamic Shariah.
According to a BBC article, “For Qutb, all non-Muslims were infidels - even the so-called ‘people of the book’, the Christians and Jews - and he predicted an eventual clash of civilisations between Islam and the west.” (19)
"Having played a large role in Nasser's power grab, the Muslim Brotherhood, after the 1949 assassination of Hassan al-Banna by government agents under new leadership and (since 1951) under the radical ideological guidance of Sayyid Qutb, demanded its due - imposition of Sharia (Islamic religious) law. When Nasser demurred, he became a Brotherhood assassination target, but with CIA and the German mercenaries' help he prevailed. In February 1954, the Brotherhood was banned. An October 1954 assassination attempt failed. Four thousand brothers were arrested, six were executed, and thousands fled to Syria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Lebanon," notes Erikson. (20)
When Nasser cracked down on the Muslim Brotherhood in 1955 they initially moved headquarters to London and Geneva. Incidentally, the head of the Geneva offices was Said Ramadan, the son-in-law of al-Banna. In Geneva, Ramadan launched the Institute for Islamic Studies – to become the civilized face of the Muslim Brotherhood, even having the distinction of dining with US President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953 at the White House. (21)
That fleeing of Muslim Brotherhood members – people who had been radicalized by Qutb, the Mufti and Nazi ideology – and the consequent spreading of their message, is something that the world is still living with.
According to that same BBC article, “Qutb and (Pakistan’s Syed Abul Ala Maududi) inspired a whole generation of Islamists, including Ayatollah Khomeini, who developed a Persian version of their works in the 1970s.
Author and journalist Robert Dreyfuss also claims that the groundwork for the Ayatollah Khomeini was done by an Iranian by the name of Ali Shariat who was influenced by the Brotherhood.
As a sidenote, with respect to Hezbollah, it is widely reported that the organization got its beginnings in Iran. That is an oversimplification.
“The origins of Shi'i Islamism in Lebanon go back not to Iran, as is commonly thought, but to Iraq in the 1960s where a Shi'i religio-political revival took place in the "circles of learning" (hawzat al-'ilmiya) in Najaf, led by the charismatic Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir as-Sadr,” according to an article in the Middle East Review of International Affairs - Sept. 1997.
“Hezbollah represented a militant, nonsecular alternative to the Nasserite Fatah, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and other groups that took their bearing from Pan-Arabism rather than Islam. Hezbollah split the Shiite community in Lebanon -- which was against Sunnis and Christians -- but most of all, engaged the Israelis. It made a powerful claim that the Palestinian movement had no future while it remained fundamentally secular and while its religious alternatives derived from the conservative Arab monarchies.” (22)
Iran’s importance only became more noted upon the death of Sadr, and the success of the Iranian Revolution led by Khomeini. By 1984, Iran was financing around 90 percent of Hezbollah’s social works in Lebanon.
As it stands now, Hezbollah “subscribes to Khomeini's theory that a religious jurist (wilayat al-faqih) should hold ultimate political power. The authority of this jurist, both spiritual and political, may not be challenged; he must be obeyed. Hezbullah sees itself fulfilling the messianic role of turning Lebanon into a province of Islam. In its "open letter" of February 1985, Hizbullah declared that Muslims must "abide by the orders of the sole wise and just command represented by the supreme jurisconsult, who is presently incarnate in the imam_Ayatollah Khomeini. It also called for a battle with vice, meaning foremost the United States, and for the destruction of Israel to make way for Palestine,” according to that same Middle East Review of International Affairs article.
Eventually, says Loftus the control of the Muslim Brotherhood passed to the United States and the CIA - or its earlier form – as a counterweight for Arab Communists.
But this still doesn't explain how we get the current form of Islam Fascists. For that one needs to remember that after Nasser expelled the Muslim Brotherhood from Egypt many of them went to Saudi Arabia.
According to Loftus, "during the 1950s, the CIA evacuated the Nazis of the Muslim Brotherhood to Saudi Arabia. Now, when they arrived in Saudi Arabia, some of the leading lights of the Muslim Brotherhood, like (Dr Abdullah) Azzam, became the teachers in the madrassas, the religious schools. And there they combined the doctrines of Nazism with this weird Islamic cult, Wahhabism.”
“Everyone thinks that Islam is this fanatical religion, but it is not. They think that Islam—the Saudi version of Islam—is typical, but it's not. The Wahhabi cult has been condemned as a heresy more than 60 times by the Muslim nations. But when the Saudis got wealthy, they bought a lot of silence. This is a very harsh cult. Wahhabism was only practised by the Taliban and in Saudi Arabia—that's how extreme it is. It really has nothing to do with Islam. Islam is a very peaceful and tolerant religion. It always had good relationships with the Jews for the first thousand years of its existence.” (23)
Interestingly, according to a Wikipedia entry on Wahhabism, Al-Banna, is said to have been influenced by the Wahhabis. “The Muslim Brotherhood also claimed to be purifying and restoring original Islam. When the Muslim Brotherhood was banned in various Middle Eastern countries, Saudi Arabia gave refuge to Brotherhood exiles. This seems to have set the stage for a mingling of Brotherhood and Wahhabi thought under the aegis of the term Salafism. Rebels against the Saudi state found justification in the thought of Sayyed Qutb, a member of the Brotherhood who spent years in Egyptian jails. Some Wahhabis, or Salafis, rejected what they call Qutbism, as a deviation from true Salafism. Thus there is now a considerable spectrum of religious opinion within Saudi Wahhabism/Salafism, to a great extent divided on the question of whether the Saudi state is to be supported, endured patiently, or violently opposed. The modern day Salafis, deny that Hassan al-Banna or Sayid Qutb were followers of the Salaf, since they upheld the view that it is allowed to overthrow the Muslim leader, and to make "Takfeer" (the act of placing a Muslim out of the fold of Islam, making him a disbeliever) on him based on Major Sins. (24)
To this last point, Trevor Stanley also writes that today there are "a profusion of self-proclaimed Salafi groups," where each accuses "the others of deviating from 'true' Salafism."
Stanley notes that "Since the 1970s, the Saudis have wisely stopped funding those Salafis that excommunicate nominally Muslim governments (or at least the Saudi government), condemning al-Qaeda as ‘the deviant sect’. The pro-Saudis correctly trace al-Qaeda’s ideological roots to Qutb and al-Banna. Less accurately, they accuse these groups of insidiously 'entering' Salafism. In fact, Salafism was imported into Saudi Arabia in its Ikhwani and Qutbist forms. This does not mean that the pro-Saudi Salafis are necessarily benign - for example, Abu Mu'aadh as-Salafee’s main criticism of Qutb and Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna is that they claim Islam teaches tolerance of Jews." (25)
Meanwhile, non-Muslims and mainstream Muslims alike use the ‘Wahhabi-Salafi’ label to denigrate Salafis and even completely unrelated groups such as the Taliban, adds Stanley.
It was in the Saudi Arabian madrassas, or schools, of Abdullah Azzam that Nazi Fascism with religious extremism were married.
And in one of those madrassas, the student Osama bin Laden studied.
"Should it further surprise us that Osama bin Laden accuses 'the Jews" of "holding America and the West hostage' given the fact, that the founder of Hamas, the Palestinian Abdullah Azzam, was at the same time the most important teacher and patron of al Qaida's leader?" asks Dr. Matthias Küntzel (26)
"The origins of Bin Laden's concept of jihad can be traced back to two early 20th century figures, who started powerful Islamic revivalist movements in response to colonialism and its aftermath," writes Fiona Symon, a Middle East analyst. "Pakistan and Egypt - both Muslim countries with a strong intellectual tradition - produced the movements and ideology that would transform the concept of jihad in the modern world."
"They blamed the western idea of the separation of religion and politics for the decline of Muslim societies ... This, they believed, could only be corrected through a return to Islam in its traditional form, in which society was governed by a strict code of Islamic law," Symon writes, adding: "Al-Banna and Maudoudi breathed new life into the concept of jihad as a holy war to end the foreign occupation of Muslim lands." (27)
Loftus – and many other authors - says that with the Russian invastion of Afghanistan in 1979, "the CIA decided to take the Arab Nazis out of cold storage."
"So we told the Saudis that we would fund them if they would bring all of the Arab Nazis together and ship them off to Afghanistan to fight the Russians," according to Loftus. "We had to rename them. We couldn't call them the Muslim Brotherhood because that was too sensitive a name. Its Nazi past was too known. So we called them Maktab al-Khadamat al-Mujahidin, the MAK." (28)
One of those people shipped off to Afghanistan, after being indoctrinated in Azzam's madrassas, was Osama bin Laden - and who in turn melded the ideas of Hassan al-Al-Banna's Muslim Brotherhood with those of Pakistan's Syed Abul Ala Maududi's Jamaat Islami after being exposed to it while fighting in Afghanistan.
Their terror has now extended to the entire world.
While the vast majority of believers in Islam certainly cannot be labeled as Islam Fascists, it remains that there is a group within the Muslim ranks that does have its roots based in National Socialism and Fascist ideologies. In an effort to brand Bush as politically incorrect, anti-Bush politicians and bloggers who are ignorant of history have become unwitting apologists for Islamo-Fascism, a movement within Islam that many Muslims claim is heretical.
Bibliography
1) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
2) Islamism, fascism and terrorism (Part 3)
3) Islamism, fascism and terrorism (Part 1)
4) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida
5) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
6) Ibid.
7) Ibid.
8) Der Mufti von Jerusalem Amin el-Husseini, und die Nationalsozialisten, Frankfurt/M. 1988, S. 234
9) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
10) Mohammad Amin al-Husayni Wikipedia
11) Nazi Influence on the Middle East During WWII
12) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
13) Nazi Influence on the Middle East During WWII
14) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida
15) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
16) Quoted from: Abd Al-Fattah Muhammad El-Awaisi, "The Muslim Brothers and the Palestine Question 1928-1947", London 1998, p. 195.
17) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
18) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida
19) Analysis: The roots of jihad
21) America's Devil's Game with Extremist Islam
22) A closer look at Hezbollah's motives
23) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida
24) Wahhabism
25) Understanding the Origins of Wahhabism and Salafism
26) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots
27) Analysis: The roots of jihad
28) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida
Robert Duncan is a journalist and ombudsman for foreign press in Spain. He is an Executive Board Member and Vice-President for the Organización de Periodismo y Comunicación Ibero-Americana, and Vice-President of the energy and telecommunications association, APSCE. He is News Editor for Spero News, and Editor-In-Chief of EnerPub. More of his writings can be found here, as well as at the Santificarnos website.
He has also been published in World Catholic News, National Catholic Register, Renew America, Lifesite.net, as well as Capital Hill Coffee House, Common Conservative, The Conservative Voice, Enter Stage Right, News By Us, Conservative Crusader, World Net Daily, Mens News Daily and others. Robert was the bureau chief for an international news agency in Madrid for many years, and was published regularly in Dow Jones Newswires, with articles appearing in The Wall Street Journal.
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Ordinary Saints
By Robert Duncan
Being a saint isn’t about living on a hilltop, or moving entire worlds thanks to charismatic leadership. Rather, it’s about fully offering skills and work in the form of a prayer that serves God on a minute-by-minute basis – even when it comes to mundane things like digging trenches.
In that respect, Nicholas Owen had it right. Born into a pious Catholic family, with two brothers who were priests - and another who was an underground publisher of Catholic books - Nicholas Owen served the Jesuits for many years before becoming a lay brother sometime around 1580. Being only slightly higher than a dwarf, he was often called “Little John.”
However, Nicholas Owen’s holiness didn’t come from belonging to any religious organization, but rather was the result of old-fashioned, sweat-making work. Nicholas Owen was a construction worker - and he must have been a good one
The Superior of the English Jesuits, Father Henry Garnet, asked Nicholas to build secret rooms in mansions throughout England where priests at that time were hiding from persecution. Nicholas’ presence at the construction sites was justified by his working on projects during the day. At night he would dig tunnels, and an assortment of “priest holes” that included hidden rooms and passages.
With time Nicholas’ curriculum began to closer resemble the Paul Newman character in the classic film “Cool Hand Luke,” than Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Besides using the aliases of Andrews and Draper, impersonating a priest, and being a jailbird, Nicholas was aiding and abetting outlaws from the English government. He was even credited with being the mastermind for a well-known priest’s escape from the Tower of London.
On paper Nicholas was anything but a saint.
The last time that Nicholas was arrested was in 1606 as part of the government’s reaction to the foiled Gunpowder Plot – a conspiracy led by some Catholics who swore an oath on the Holy Sacrament to blow up King James and the Parliament for the exacting of harsh penalties on English Catholics.
With the English government believing that the Jesuits were behind the planning of the Gunpowder Plot, a wide net was cast. At the time of his arrest Nicholas was impersonating Father Henry Garnet, the Jesuit Superior.
Upon the capture of Nicholas, England’s Secretary of State, Sir Robert Cecil the First Earl of Salisbury, is said to have written, “how great was the joy caused by his arrest . . . knowing the great skill of Owen in constructing hiding places, and the innumerable quantity of dark holes which he had schemed for hiding priests all through England.”
Nicholas was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He refused to give information and was the subject of violent torture: His body was suspended by the placing of his arms in iron rings, while heavy weights were placed upon his feet.
But Nicholas’ nasty and lengthy death isn’t alone what makes him a saint.
There is no way of knowing how many priests Nicholas’ hidden passages saved, but thanks much to this diminutive construction worker the Catholic faith in England was preserved.
In this respect, Nicholas is a model for all of us: to offer our daily labor - no matter how humble it might be - to God as a prayer. In that way we are all called to be ordinary saints - that’s the rule, not the exception.
Background:
Born in Oxford, England at an unknown date, St Nicholas died in the Tower of London in 1606. He was beatified in 1929, and canonized in 1970 by Pope Paul VI as one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales whose joint Feast Day is October 25.
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Christian drinking and cookie eating
By Robert Duncan
What do you think? Can a Christian have a drink? If you believe a press release from ChristiaNet.com, touted as "the world's largest Christian portal with twelve million monthly page loads," the answer would be no.
ChristiaNet regularly sends out press releases to surveys that it runs, including a recent one on whether or not it was licit for a Christian to drink beer. The answer, according to ChristiaNet was "No".
But the answer to that poll is overtly misleading on several grounds.
First, it's an exclusive poll aimed at some Christians who have a very limited, and unique definition of what is a Christian, most likely of an evangelical flavor, which is a fairly modern interpretation of Christianity in the 2000 years of the religion's history - and would certainly rule out the majority of the world's Christians such as Catholics, Anglicans and Orthodox .
Secondly, it's a poll most definitely meant for Americans: "eighty persons who participated in the poll seemed to think it is okay for Christians to drink beer. The overall consensus with this group makes the distinction that it should be done in moderation and not to get drunk. One person made the point, 'It's acceptable unless abused or causes someone else to sin.'"
As an aside, this indeed is a new interpretation to Paul's answer of if it is okay to eat food offered to idols. Note in the original context, when Paul said it was acceptable, he was talking about food that had been offered to the idols, and the heathen priests in turn sold in the market. Paul argued that since the idols were not real nor was the god's of the heathen, then there was no real problem eating the food. Another thing was if there was a person who didn't have the formed conscience.
ChristiaNet added: "So many that answered yes also made the distinction that it should be done sensibly, perhaps in the privacy of one's home with a spouse or in the company of other mature Christians who act responsibly."
So I guess all us folks that live in Europe and like to share a bottle of wine over a meal are heathen, or at least we should do it in the privacy of our homes. Now if I could just get my favorite restaurant to bring their staff to my home to prepare the meal they way they do in their establishment.
Third, the poll size causes one to wonder about the validity of the survey. If the site really gets 12 million monthly page loads then why did only 339 people bother to respond to the survey, and then only 197 as against drinking "beer"?
"The majority of 197 out of 339 respondents felt that it isn't appropriate behavior for several reasons. One person said, 'Alcohol takes control of a person's body and does not honor God's temple.' Respondents seemed to agree overall that drinking beer, wine, liquor, or alcoholic beverages of any kind is wrong. One participant made a good point about excessive drinking contributing to car accidents and domestic violence," ChristiaNet said.
And then - just in case a person still might think there is nothing wrong with having a drink, ChristiaNet pontificates: "While an occasional drink might have some health benefits, too much can cause health problems. The risk of becoming addicted to it should be considered by those who are tempted. Each person should examine themselves and determine if they are susceptible. When intoxication takes hold it is easier to do things one wouldn't normally do and could make it much easier to sin." And this statement: "For God's children, everything in life should be measured by His word and seeking answers through prayer. God's children should not indulge in something that takes control of them but instead let Him be in control by exhibiting the Fruits of the Spirit."
One could suspect there are other reasons why ChristiaNet keeps publishing such dubious surveys and then sending out press releases - could it be that the site is seeking visitors to come to its webpage to buy the various products it advertizes?
Still, all of this reminds me of a story.
There was this businessman who had a very busy day and wasn't able to make it to lunch. On his way to boarding the plane he passed a shop in the airport that was selling various snacks, and he bought a bag of cookies - thinking that they could tide him over while on his short flight to home.
Once aboard the businessman sat down and began to read a book, and didn't really pay that much attention to what was going on around him, other than he noticed the woman who sat down next to him.
In a short matter of time, our businessman began to feel some hunger pains, so he reached down while reading his book to feel for the bag of cookies. Getting the bag, without looking up, he tore open the packaging and took out a cookie and ate it.
What to his surprise but the woman next to him without asking permission then picked up the bag and took out a cookie and ate it too!
Needless to say, he was surprised ... as I am sure that you and I would be.
Time passed and soon the businessman felt hungry again, so he reached down and took another cookie and ate it. And just as the first time, the woman followed his actions and grabbed one for herself, and ate it.
Well you can imagine the thoughts that went through the businessman's head, about how rude this person was and other things similar or worse.
To cut the story short, this pattern continued - each time the man took a cookie, then the woman would.
Finally there was only one more cookie.
Then what to the businessman's surprise the woman reached over and grabbed the last cookie, and then broke it into two, and handed him one of the halves.
To say that he was surprised at the woman's actions, if not plain rudeness, would be of no surprise. But gritting his teeth he thanked the woman with a nod of his head, and ate his half of the cookie - all the while thinking horrible things about how this woman had unjustly treated him.
In a short order the plane landed and the passengers disembarked.
On the way out of the plane, the businessman realized that he had forgotten his briefcase and so he went back to his seat. What to his surprise to discover that along with his briefcase there was also a bag that contained a whole, unopened package of cookies.
And then it dawned on him, he had unwittingly grabbed the woman's package of cookies and opened it, and it was he - not the woman - who was eating the other person's cookies.
This isn't a lesson about relativism, but when it comes to determining Christian behaviour by Sola Scriptura arguments, perhaps its best to see what has been traditionally taught and avoid overstatements.
Or in the words of my father, "just remember when pointing fingers at people that there is one pointing away, and four pointing back."
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Short Interview With Anglican Bishop Henry Scriven
By Robert Duncan
Some readers may know that I am an Anglican convert – having found the Roman Catholic Church via a sidetrip, conveniently enough allowing me to call myself Catholic without taking the final plunge.
To this day my Anglican memories are sprinkled with images from Madrid’s St George’s Church, where I enjoyed the company of expats in the garden under a sprawling fig tree that shielded us from the scorching Spanish summer heat. Particularly included in those memories are the Fourth of July BBQ’s we Americans held, but to show we were an international crowd served with pints of Guinness.
Read the rest ...
Paradise Lost: The Toll Of Illegal Immigration In Spain
By Robert Duncan
On the southernmost tip of Tarifa's Santo Cristo de las Animas Catholic cemetery, almost two dozen illegal Muslim immigrants have found their final resting place overlooking the sea with the African mountains forming a backdrop upon the horizon.
Nearby a marble plaque lies on the ground: "In memory of the immigrants who died in the waters of the Strait of Gibraltar." Throughout the cemetery are niches marked with the singular phrase "Moroccan Immigrant."
It is said that a local Catholic priest has in the past arranged for the immigrants to be buried according to Muslim customs.
For others, however, there will be no funeral.
Such as the 11 sub-Saharan immigrants that died from cold and dehydration in 2005 while trying to raft to Spain's Canary Islands. Their bodies were tossed into the water, according to the one woman and 12 men who survived them in rickety craft. Spanish authorities began searching for the raft after finding the bodies of a man and a six-month pregnant woman that had washed up on the Canary Island coasts.
But theirs, sadly, is also the story of many more.
Nuclear Energy Prospects For New Brunswick, Canada
This morning I was interviewed by Canadian radio CBC regarding the visit of New Brunswick Premier Shawn Graham to France, where there is talk he could be looking at striking a deal for a French-made nuclear reactor for New Brunswick.
Following is an edited and updated transcript of that interview.
What kind of success have the French had when it comes to exporting nuclear power technology?
RD: I’d say pretty good, especially when you consider that Areva is the world’s largest integrated nuclear company. Areva NP, the nuclear energy branch of the company, had EUR3 billion in revenues in 2005, and employees over 14,000.
Also, Areva has built over 100 reactors in 11 different countries, and there is a growing interest in North America.
On top of that, 30% of the world’s electricity that comes from nuclear energy, is provided by Areva designed reactors.
How about North America?
RD: Areva does operate in North America, and in Canada in particular, primarily through subsidiaries in mining, and the company has over 7,000 employees in North America.
That said in 2005, Areva set up with stakeholder Siemens a joint venture specifically aimed at developing commercial nuclear generation in North America. The licensing and engineering work is done primarily in our Charlotte, North Carolina, and Lynchburg, Virginia.
One of the interesting things about Areva’s North American venture is that they are developing what is called a Generation IV high temperature gas reactor.
What sense do you have that Areva would be willing to take a run at building a Nuclear power plant in Canada?
RD: I would say that Areva would be very interested in such a project, given that they have setup a North American company just for that purpose. That said, there would have to still be done feasibility studies, to see if it’s even worth doing such a project.
What kind of public support is there for nuclear within France?
RD: In France there is very broad support for the nuclear industry, this is a direct result of the government taking the line in the 1970s that the country needed to be energy independent.
In other words, if you want to think of it this way, it was nationalism to a certain extant that led the government to be nuclear energy friendly.
The support of the government is such that in 2004 nuclear power represented almost 40% of the country’s total energy produced.
Here is another number to compare … In 1973 65% of France’s gross electricity output came from hydrocarbons. Now compare that to in 2004, when nuclear power represented 79% of the national total.
How much government support does the industry have?
RD: Well one of the reasons for the success in France, is the model is a bit different. Basically you have a state-controlled company, Areva,that controls all aspects related to the generation of nuclear energy.
Nuclear power works in France because primarily it is extremely efficient and it’s done at a low cost. And more importantly, for consumers, French electricity tariffs are the lowest in Europe.
You could say that this is one clear example of where a monopoly has actually worked in favour of consumers.
How about France's neighbours? (Germany? Spain? Scandinavia? UK?)
RD: Things are a bit different throughout Europe.
Nuclear power provides around one-third of the European Union's electricity supply, making it the most dependent region on nuclear power.
But to understand that, you need to look a bit deeper at the numbers …
Of the eight Member States of the European Union operating nuclear power
plants, five have adopted or announced a moratorium. Those countries are Sweden, Spain, the Netherlands (one plant), Germany and Belgium.
In the cases of Sweden, German and Belgium, these three countries in western Europe get between 30% and 50% of their power from nuclear power.
Italy renounced nuclear power after a referendum in 1987.
Austria, Ireland and Luxembourg remain antinuclear
This leaves three Member States in favour of nuclear energy – Finland, France and the United Kingdom, minus the new Member States.
UK
The UK has 19 reactors generating one fifth of its electricity, but current plans will see all but one of those retired by 2023. That said the government’s commitment to the future of nuclear energy is firming due to energy security concerns as current reactors approach the end of operating life and the need to limit CO2 emissions.
However, there may be some PR work that needs to be done …
Support for replacing nuclear power plants that will close due to their age has dropped to 35%, from 39% in November 2006 and a high of 41% in November 2005. But the change was not mirrored by an increase in opposition, which has stayed at around 28-30% since December 2004. Instead, more people say they are unsure.
Finland
Finland has four nuclear reactors providing 27% of its electricity. A fifth reactor was approved by the government in 2002, on economic, energy security and environmental grounds. This is now under construction for 2011 start-up.
Finland's reactors are among the world's most efficient, with average capacity factors over the 1990s of 94%.
Germany
The opposite case is probably Germany, where that country is phasing out by 2015 its 17 reactors.
Germany is also an interesting case, as the International Energy Agency recently warned Germany that if it intends to continue with phasing out its nuclear reactors, then it will be very difficult for that country to lower its carbon emission and Kyoto requirements.
And I think that is actually quite ironic, because now we have a scenario where the so-called green environmentalists who demanded the closing of reactors can actually find themselves on the same side as that of the polluters.
Spain
In Spain, the plants still run although there is no current hope of building a new plant given the moratorium. Spain has 8 nuclear reactors generating a fifth of its electricity
What is the EU attitude toward nuclear energy
RD: In the last few months here in Europe the subject of nuclear energy is beginning to creep up a bit more in the press.
Part of the reason for this is because this past January - for the first time ever - the EU made a stab at creating a comprehensive EU energy policy, and openly supported new nuclear generating capacity.
According to some research from the European Union, if something isn’t done now, within the next 20 to 30 years more than 70% of Europe’s energy requirements will be covered by imports.
Compare that to around 45% of all hydrocarbon imports now.
Interestingly, the EU also argued that these new plants were needed not only to guarantee the supply of energy, but also to lower carbon emissions to meet Kyoto objectives.
What plans do those countries have to deal with rising energy costs?
RD: At this stage, most countries are banking still on hydrocarbons, such as natural gas and liquefied natural gas.
There is also a lot of talk about renewable energies, but as it stands now renewable energies are actually more expensive – meaning in turn consumers will actually be paying more. Now some people do argue that this is indeed what is needed, to help lower energy use you should charge people more.
Then there is the talk about switching over to bio-fuels, but even here this is creating problems – especially in Germany, where land speculation for biofuel crops is driving land and food prices higher.
Are there any European companies outside of France the Premeir should also be talking to?
RD: I personally think that any time you are talking about spending billions of dollars to build a nuclear reactor, of course you need to take a look at the competition.
If anything so that you can come back to taxpayers and say that you did your homework.
And I am sure that this is something that indeed the Premier and his team will do, if they decide to go ahead with any such project.
That said, as mentioned Areva is indeed a heavyweight and the world leader in the sector. Of course there are other companies such as Fortum.
But saying that, I wouldn’t want to recommend any specific company.
Are there questions of health concern and safety?
RD: Well I understand that several large studies in the US, Canada, and Europe have found no evidence of any increase in cancer among people living near nuclear facilities.
Also the third generation reactors are said to be designed to be safer and more efficient. Besides being “less susceptible to a terrorist attack,” each of these third generation reactors will produce around 1,600 megawatts of electricity, almost double the current amount that second-generation reactors produce.
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