This Week's Headlines

As another week comes to an end, this is your chance to top off your glass with a final helping of news, current events, and just plain interesting stuff that may not have made into the mainstream media. A chance to linger for a few more moments before we close the door on the week. Below are some links to articles, blogs, and miscellaneous happenings that caught my eye over the past few days. Sample what you like - I'll serve up more next Friday...

Four reasons why the Bread of Life Discourse cannot be a metaphor - "Most, though not all, Protestants wiggle and fidget as they come to the Bread of Life Discourse in the sixth chapter of the Gospel according to St. John; and they have good reason to be disturbed! "

The Most Effective and Radical Remedy Against Idolatry - Pope Benedict XVI: "Adoring the Body of Christ, means believing that there, in that piece of Bread [with a capital-B], Christ is really there, and gives true sense to life, to the immense universe as to the smallest creature, to the whole of human history as to the most brief existence.”

A new Consistory after summer - "Noises are being made in the Vatican about a possible Consistory for the creation of new cardinals in autumn or possibly later, in the first few months of 2012."

In New York, Marriage "Altered Radically and Forever" - "...after weeks of heated debate and charged negotiations, the New York Senate approved a same-sex marriage bill by a 33-29 vote, making the Empire State the sixth -- and, by far, most consequential -- Stateside jurisdiction to enact full legal status for gay unions.

How to Destroy a Culture in five Easy Steps - "...while Americans may profess to worship Allah, Jehovah, or Jesus, we mostly worship an American Idol—ourselves. That is why social libertarianism has become our country’s fastest-growing cult."

‘Gay Marriage,’ Libertarians, and Civil Rights - "'Gay marriage' in fact represents a vast expansion of state power: In this instance, the state of New York is declaring that it has the competence to redefine a basic human institution in order to satisfy the demands of an interest group looking for the kind of social acceptance that putatively comes from legal recognition."

Two Reasons Same-Sex Marriage Is Gaining Ground - "...marriage laws are by definition discriminatory. They discriminate FOR families (not against non-married persons) in order to build up what is good for society."

Two Questions: Do We Need to Use a Different Word for Marriage in the Church? and, Should Catholic Clergy Cease Signing Civil “Marriage” Licenses?

Redefining Marriage - Part I and Part II [In my opinion, Part II is especially good.]

How to Be Immodest About Modesty - "After a certain point, thinking about modesty all the time is just another way of thinking about sex all the time.  No matter how you got there, it’s not a good place to be."


Sixth Circuit’s Obamacare Decision on the Way to the Supreme Court - "By granting Congress such broad powers under the Commerce Clause, the appellate court has created a new kind of power not previously known to the jurisprudence, which effectively grants the federal government state police power, thereby rendering any notion of the constitutionally mandated federalism dead letter law.  This is a dangerous precedent.”
 

The Church Built on Peter - [Interesting article on the history of Peter's tomb] "When the tropaion of Peter was found underneath the high altar during archaeological excavations in 1941, there was great rejoicing, because it matched what Gaius had written at the end of the second century. Even more exciting was the fact that they found bones in what was clearly Peter’s tomb underneath the victory monument."

Video of Pope Benedict XVI launching new website via iPad