Political rant
Before I get on a roll, I want to put out a quick request for prayer's for Lois' sister. She was in a car accident this weekend with her kids. Everyone's ok but Loi's sister was banged up pretty good. Pray for a speedy recovery.
Now, on with the ranting.
I read a couple of articles in this weekend's newspapers that annoyed me. The first concerned the impending release of a Vatican document that spells out new rules/restrictions for allowing gay men to enter the seminary to become priests. Gay men will not be prohibited from the priesthood, but will be "more carefully screened". My question is, why? There appears to be the underlying assumption that gay men are intrisically evil and will lust after young boys in the congregation.
I'm sorry, but a priest is called to be celibate. That should be a determining factor prior to ordaining someone. Can they realistically live up to that vow and calling. First of all, gay men are not pedophiles by nature any more than straight men are pedophiles. Second, why are we singling them out? Straight priests aren't attracted to women? They don't have to supress those urges as well? Please. Third, there are many girls now that are alter servers. While there have been no scandals concerning abusing girls in the church, isn't it the same issue? We need to protect all of our children.
Again, the bottom line should be the qualification of the person to be a priest and the ability to live up to their vows. Sexual preference doesn't really matter as a priest isn't supposed to be having sex anyway.
Next thing that annoyed my was Bush's attack against those opposed to the war in Iraq. He accused them of trying to rewrite history in attacking the "pre-war intelligence" that was the justification for the war. And justification is the correct word. I don't remember all the details, but I do recall at least 2 or 3 other justifications for this war prior to its start. First we had the justification that Iraq was a safe haven for Al-Queda, Bin Laden, and terrorists. Exept it wasn't and the public didn't buy it. Then there was the excuse that Sadaam was a threat to national security. Which we all knew he was not. What was he going to do, attack us with his 2 military aircraft? THEN there was WMD's. But before this whole "intelligence failure" thing came up, we already figured out there weren't any WMD's so all of a sudden we were bringing "democracy" to the region.
The Bush team has been trying to WRITE the history to suit the objective, which was to get Sadaam out of power. I don't know why Bush felt he had to go, but that I think is the real reason behind the way. Now Bush is accusing others of rewriting the history he tried to write. The bottom line is that we've spent a lot of resourses (in money and personnel) to get involved in a fight that wasn't ours and that didn't need to be fought. I could tell from day one when the retoric started, nearly a year before the war started, that we were going to invade Iraq. All the "diplomacy" was just a show to be able to say that we tried every other alternative to invasion. Except we didn't try any diplomacy. Because making outrageous demands you know the other guy will reject is not diplomacy. It's just rhetoric.
Which is all you get from the Bush administration. Rhetoric.
Now, on with the ranting.
I read a couple of articles in this weekend's newspapers that annoyed me. The first concerned the impending release of a Vatican document that spells out new rules/restrictions for allowing gay men to enter the seminary to become priests. Gay men will not be prohibited from the priesthood, but will be "more carefully screened". My question is, why? There appears to be the underlying assumption that gay men are intrisically evil and will lust after young boys in the congregation.
I'm sorry, but a priest is called to be celibate. That should be a determining factor prior to ordaining someone. Can they realistically live up to that vow and calling. First of all, gay men are not pedophiles by nature any more than straight men are pedophiles. Second, why are we singling them out? Straight priests aren't attracted to women? They don't have to supress those urges as well? Please. Third, there are many girls now that are alter servers. While there have been no scandals concerning abusing girls in the church, isn't it the same issue? We need to protect all of our children.
Again, the bottom line should be the qualification of the person to be a priest and the ability to live up to their vows. Sexual preference doesn't really matter as a priest isn't supposed to be having sex anyway.
Next thing that annoyed my was Bush's attack against those opposed to the war in Iraq. He accused them of trying to rewrite history in attacking the "pre-war intelligence" that was the justification for the war. And justification is the correct word. I don't remember all the details, but I do recall at least 2 or 3 other justifications for this war prior to its start. First we had the justification that Iraq was a safe haven for Al-Queda, Bin Laden, and terrorists. Exept it wasn't and the public didn't buy it. Then there was the excuse that Sadaam was a threat to national security. Which we all knew he was not. What was he going to do, attack us with his 2 military aircraft? THEN there was WMD's. But before this whole "intelligence failure" thing came up, we already figured out there weren't any WMD's so all of a sudden we were bringing "democracy" to the region.
The Bush team has been trying to WRITE the history to suit the objective, which was to get Sadaam out of power. I don't know why Bush felt he had to go, but that I think is the real reason behind the way. Now Bush is accusing others of rewriting the history he tried to write. The bottom line is that we've spent a lot of resourses (in money and personnel) to get involved in a fight that wasn't ours and that didn't need to be fought. I could tell from day one when the retoric started, nearly a year before the war started, that we were going to invade Iraq. All the "diplomacy" was just a show to be able to say that we tried every other alternative to invasion. Except we didn't try any diplomacy. Because making outrageous demands you know the other guy will reject is not diplomacy. It's just rhetoric.
Which is all you get from the Bush administration. Rhetoric.
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