Category: Society & Common Good

Chen, the Conscience of China
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Chen, the Conscience of China

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I was going to devote this article to my recent trip to New Zealand, where I gave seven talks to a total of over 3,000 people. But then a blind Chinese human rights activist named Chen Guangcheng escaped from house arrest, and my phone began to ring off the hook. The media wanted to know […]

Catholic Business Leaders File Federal Lawsuit Challenging HHS Mandate
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Catholic Business Leaders File Federal Lawsuit Challenging HHS Mandate

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The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, today announced it has filed a federal lawsuit challenging the HHS mandate, on behalf of Legatus, the Nation’s largest organization of top Catholic business CEOs and professional leaders. Also joining in the lawsuit as Plaintiffs are the Weingartz Supply […]

You Should Be Worried!
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You Should Be Worried!

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“He moved about freely with them in Jerusalem, and spoke out boldly in the name of the Lord.  He also spoke and debated with the Hellenists, but they tried to kill him.” (Acts 9:29, NAB) When St. Paul began traveling throughout the Roman Empire, truly going into the culture of death in order to proclaim […]

The Last Line of Defense
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The Last Line of Defense

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The larger political landscape seems like a vicious quagmire (which indeed it may be) but it also offers valuable topics for discussion around the water cooler and in the car-pool line. While the HHS mandate is primarily an assault on religious liberties, those with courage and conviction can use the opening to discuss the Catholic […]

Pro-Abortion and Pro-Gay Youth Lobby Sent Home Empty-Handed from UN
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Pro-Abortion and Pro-Gay Youth Lobby Sent Home Empty-Handed from UN

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Youth activists arrived at the UN in droves in an attempt to hijack the 45thsession of the Commission on Population and Development (CPD) by promoting homosexual rights and abortion. However, countries rejected their demands and produced a fairly balanced outcome document that focuses on more pressing youth concerns like education, employment, health and development. Sponsored […]

<i>Afghanization</i>
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Afghanization

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President Barack Obama’s five-point plan for turning the war back to the Afghans is designed to cover the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces and “forge a just and lasting peace.” What does the plan involve, and can it work? Here are the five points: 1.   Making Afghans responsible for their own security within two […]

Church Wins Zoning Appeal; City Surrenders
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Church Wins Zoning Appeal; City Surrenders

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[Thursday], the Becket Fund and a Christian church in Texas scored a huge victory for religious freedom.   After five years of litigation, the Elijah Group, an evangelical Christian church in Leon Valley, Texas, has finally gained the right to use its building for worship without discrimination from the city government. The settlement follows a […]

Book Review: <i>Suicide of a Superpower</i>
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Book Review: Suicide of a Superpower

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I was nearing the close of Pat Buchanan’s new book Suicide of a Superpower (St. Martin’s Press) when I read that MSNBC had fired him as a political commentator for expressing views offensive to political correctness as practiced at that left-leaning network. (“Left-leaning” as applied to MSNBC comes from the Los Angeles Times, which is […]

Carter to Obama: Same Old Story on Energy Policy
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Carter to Obama: Same Old Story on Energy Policy

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As spring bloomed, the president addressed the nation on energy. The president told us, “Without our planning for the future, it will get worse … The oil and natural gas that we rely on for 75 percent of our energy is simply running out.” Unless profound changes are made in the next decade, the president […]

Aiming at China, Blind Lawyer Forces U.S. to Deal with Forced Abortions
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Aiming at China, Blind Lawyer Forces U.S. to Deal with Forced Abortions

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One man is forcing Hillary Clinton to pay attention to abuses against women. The woman who famously said in Beijing in 1995 that “women’s rights are human rights” has been excruciatingly silent since she’s come into power about one of the worst abuses against women. Mrs. Clinton’s first trip to China as U.S. Secretary of […]

Upcoming Movie Review: <i>For Greater Glory</i>
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Upcoming Movie Review: For Greater Glory

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I’m doing something I’ve never done before. I’ve never written a movie review for a movie I have not yet seen or a book review for book I have not yet read. But I am so excited by the “buzz” about an upcoming movie that I thought I’d let you in on some of it. […]

Nine Lawsuits for Religious Freedom – A Brief Rundown of the Arguments
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Nine Lawsuits for Religious Freedom – A Brief Rundown of the Arguments

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There are now nine lawsuits, including one brought by Priests for Life, that have been filed in federal district courts around the country challenging the Obama administration’s HHS mandate that requires employers to provide coverage for activities that many of them believe people should not do. There is value to having multiple lawsuits because, having […]

Energy: Pennsylvania's Choice, America's Model
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Energy: Pennsylvania’s Choice, America’s Model

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We can’t drill our way to energy independence. Or so proclaims the president and many of his supporters. Here in Pennsylvania, the proclamation rings hollow; we are in the midst of a historic natural gas boom. Pennsylvania has an abundant supply of natural gas locked up in the geology of the Marcellus Shale, thousands of feet below two-thirds […]

The "Hatchet Man" Turned Bridge-Builder
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The “Hatchet Man” Turned Bridge-Builder

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When Charles W. “Chuck” Colson died last week, the headlines screamed about the death of President Richard Nixon’s “hatchet man,” who tumbled from his perch as White House chief counsel after pleading guilty to obstruction of justice in 1974. Some squeezed in fleeting references to the way Colson spent the second half of his life, […]

Losing the Jihadists' War on America
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Losing the Jihadists’ War on America

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Have you ever asked yourself why, despite more than ten years of efforts – involving, among other things, the loss of thousands of lives in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, well-over a trillion dollars spent, countless man-years wasted waiting in airport security lines and endless efforts to ensure that no offense is given to seemingly […]

GOP Insiders Just Don't Get It
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GOP Insiders Just Don’t Get It

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With Mitt Romney now the presumptive Republican nominee, the battle for the 2012 Presidency has begun in earnest.  And, as is not uncommon, the outcome of this year’s race is expected to hinge on that that slice of the electorate that doesn’t pledge fealty to any political party, the so-called independent voters.  According to a […]

Ireland’s Abortion Bill Defeated
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Ireland’s Abortion Bill Defeated

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The Irish Parliament has rejected a bill by a 109-20 vote that was aimed at making abortion more widely available to its citizens. While the measure purports to only legalize abortion “for termination of pregnancy where a real and substantial risk to the life of the pregnant woman exists,” the bill’s sponsor, Clare Daly, of […]

On Hope and Hate: Week One of Obama v. Romney
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On Hope and Hate: Week One of Obama v. Romney

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Something wonderful unfolded in American politics the last few days. Almost immediately after Rick Santorum dropped out of the Republican presidential hunt, David Axelrod and the Obama reelection team unleashed the class-warfare cannons. They expected to enjoy the first salvo of the season, fired by Democratic lobbyist Hilary Rosen. In a CNN interview, Rosen claimed […]

Why Do SNAP and VOTF Fear the Case of Fr. Gordon MacRae?
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Why Do SNAP and VOTF Fear the Case of Fr. Gordon MacRae?

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Last month, I was invited by the editors of These Stone Walls to write a “Special Report” about a new development in the case of Father Gordon MacRae, a priest of the Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire whom I believe – to a moral certainty – has been wrongly imprisoned for nearly 18 years. My […]

Sick Chickens and Sick Laws
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Sick Chickens and Sick Laws

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When President Obama made his famous declaration about how he was confident that “that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress,” many observers figured the chief executive missed April Fools’ Day by a […]

Movie Review: <em>The Hunger Games</em>
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Movie Review: The Hunger Games

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The Hunger Games is set in a way beyond dystopia future in which the rulers living in the Third-Reich-like “Capitol” keep the peons in the “Districts” in fear and subjugation by holding gladiatorial games each year. The combatants are children and teenagers, picked at random to fight to the death, each representing their District. And […]

Courtroom Terror
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Courtroom Terror

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Apologists often try to explain away Islamic terrorism as a byproduct of something else. The usual argument is that, because Muslims are politically, socially, or militarily weak—the archetypal example often given is Israel vis-à-vis the Palestinians—they have no choice but to resort to terror to strike at their stronger adversaries. In other words, they resort […]

The Political Compromise of Our Security
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The Political Compromise of Our Security

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A troubling pattern of putting U.S. and allied security interests second to the Obama administration’s political priorities is now well-established.  If allowed to continue, it will not only make the world more dangerous.  It is going to get people killed – probably in large numbers and some of them may be Americans. A prime example […]

Judicial Activists Undermine the Democratic Process
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Judicial Activists Undermine the Democratic Process

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Last week, President Obama made news when he suggested that it would be “unprecedented” for the Supreme Court to declare unconstitutional a law passed by a “strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.”  His comments were prompted by the less than favorable reaction of the Supreme Court during oral arguments on the constitutionality of his […]