ONE of the most disturbing things about Pope Francis’s recent comments on the plane from Rome to Rio was his implication that the Church may legitimately view homosexuality as a permanent inclination and a form of identity. But there is no such thing as a Christian homosexual. There are obviously Christians who have homosexual desires, but not homosexual Christians. Here is some deeper analysis of the Pope’s remarks at the sedevacantist website, Novus Ordo Watch. Novus Ordo writes:

Francis plays right into the wrong-headed but widespread idea that some people are homosexual in their identity, in their nature, as part of “who they are”. This is exactly what modern-day liberals want you to believe, that just as people are biologically either male or female, so they are also biologically either heterosexual or homosexual.

Nonsense! If a Catholic accepts this idea, he has already crossed the line….

Also, here is a reader’s comment on the same subject that came in before the Pope’s remarks on the plane to Rome.

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HERE IS a great comment by a reader from a 2012 post, “On the Myth of Neutral Schools.” Greg J. wrote:

REBECCA ANN CLARK has filed a complaint with the Quebec Human Rights Commission because she was asked by a lifeguard to wear a shirt on a Montreal beach after she was seen strolling down the beach half-undressed, according to the CBC. She says if men are not required to wear tops, women shouldn’t have to wear them either.

She’s got a point. There is no working principle by which the Human Rights Commission can deny her claim. To differentiate between the sexes, except in cases where criminal charges are filed against men or jobs are granted to women, is to discriminate. That’s bad. Therefore, female nudity is good.

One would like to ask Miss Clark if she truly wants the world to view her chest as the same as a man’s and whether she has noticed that female toplessness is a hallmark of less advanced cultures (see image below). But it is probably pointless to intrude upon this highly intelligent woman’s revolutionary high. Miss Clark, assuming this report is correct, is merely practicing her religion. Filing a complaint with the Quebec Human Rights Commission is a sacrament that confers extraordinary grace. If it takes outright nudity to achieve this state of sanctification and keep the forces of the Quebec Inquisition busy, so be it.

[WARNING: IMPROPER IMAGE BELOW.]

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HENRY McCULLOCH writes:

One of The New York Times‘s Designated Homosexuals, the columnist Frank Bruni, Has A Dream that must send a thrill up his leg. In his dream, Bruni imagines U.S. athletes taking a stand for sodomy at next year’s Winter Olympics in Sochi. Sochi, you see, is in Russia. And the Russians are Very Bad – Mean, even – to sodomites. Bruni’s column perfectly captures the arrogant oddity of America today: censoriously hectoring the rest of the world in the promotion, not of virtue, but of vice.

The thrilling vision Mr. Bruni offers his readers is of U.S. athletes in the opening parade at the Sochi Olympics, teaching those big, bad, homophobic Russians a lesson. One by one, in Bruni’s tingly imaginings, the strolling U.S. athletes pull out handkerchief-sized rainbow flags, and wave them! Take That, Vladimir Putin, You Big Homophobic Meanie You!

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ADAM writes:

This photo of Kerry announcing visa changes to allow same-sex “spouses” the same immigration benefits as married couples is the first thing that greeted me at the top of the homepage for the U.S. Department of State when I visited that website yesterday as I was preparing to travel abroad next week.

I had heard of this policy change before, but still there’s something shocking about seeing it in print and promoted as the top news item at the State Department website. I understand that marriage fraud is a fairly common way for unscrupulous individuals to gain entry and residency to the U.S. As it is, immigration officials have the difficult task of interviewing couples to determine whether a marriage is real or a sham. The problem with same-sex couples is that their union is by-definition a sham, as “marriage” between two people of the same sex has no basis in tradition, history, or law, and because such a union cannot produce children. I’m trying to imagine the kind of questions the immigration officer could ask to determine if the homosexual couple’s “marriage” is legitimate or a sham. How awkward!

I predict that this policy will result in a dramatic increase in marriage fraud for purposes of immigration, as there will be no way to legitimately screen out sham marriages. (more…)

KARL D. writes:

I have been on Facebook for the last several years, something which is both a blessing and a curse. It has allowed me to re-connect with people from my past which is a good thing. But on the downside it has allowed me to re-connect with people from my past. I was never a liberal, but I was more of a centrist in my late teens and early 20s.

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  APPARENTLY, women have never excelled in the field of philosophy because of sexual harassment. See The New York Times's report, which includes this disturbing bit of news: In July, after the sociologist Kieran Healy published a study showing that women made up less than 4 percent of top citations in leading philosophy journals since 1992, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy sent out an e-mail asking contributors to make sure that entries do not cite work by white men on a given topic while ignoring prior contributions by women and other underrepresented groups. Such “citation blindness,” scholars say, may be less a result of overt discrimination than of implicit bias, a phenomenon that has generated a rich literature in psychology, but that philosophers are only beginning to study. The dumbing down of philosophy is well underway.

  FROM Fox News: Government workers in the city of Seattle have been advised that the terms "citizen" and "brown bag" are potentially offensive and may no longer be used in official documents and discussions. KOMO-TV reports that the city's Office of Civil Rights instructed city workers in a recent internal memo to avoid using the words because some may find them offensive. "Luckily, we've got options," Elliott Bronstein of the Office for Civil Rights wrote in the memo obtained by the station. "For 'citizens,' how about 'residents?'" In an interview with Seattle's KIRO Radio, Bronstein said the term "brown bag" has been used historically as a way to judge skin color. [cont.]

ARS ORANDI posted an excerpt today from St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori’s work Uniformity with God’s Will:

Let us now take up in a practical way the consideration of those matters in which we should unite ourselves to God’s will.

1. In external matters. In times of great heat, cold or rain; in times of famine, epidemics and similar occasions we should refrain from expressions like these: “What unbearable heat!” “What piercing cold!” “What a tragedy!” In these instances we should avoid expressions indicating opposition to God’s will. We should want things to be just as they are, because it is God who thus disposes them. (more…)

MARIO BERGNER analyzes in this video posted at Heteroseparatist.com the psychological forces that led him to feel sexual desire for men and turn to the homosexual life as a young man. He says the overwhelming cause was his weak attachment to his father.

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THE negative consequences continue to unfold for Eagles wide receiver Riley Cooper, who did something so heinous he has been fined by the NFL, been widely condemned for an act of singular atrocity and has decided to leave the game for awhile. What did Cooper do? He used the N-word.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Cooper announced today that he is going to leave the team for now and enter counseling:

“The last few days have been incredibly difficult for me,” Cooper said. “My actions were inexcusable. The more I think about what I did, the more disgusted I get. I keep trying to figure out how I could have said something so repulsive, and what I can do to make things better.

The truth is there is nothing he can do. He is a permanent social outcast. He might as well find an island somewhere where he can live out his remaining days in seclusion. Cooper also said:

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STEVE KOGAN writes:

The issue of “women’s rights” was almost a century old when Nietzsche cut it to the quick with a five word response: “Feminism: the uglification of Europe.” For years, I found nothing to match its bite until I recently came across the following reminiscence in The Dostoevsky Archive: Firsthand Accounts of the Novelist from Contemporaries’ Memoirs and Rare Periodicals (1997). The account is taken from the memoirs of a Prince Vladimir Meshchersky (St. Petersburg, 1898), a friend of Tchaikowsky’s and the grandson of Nikolai Karamzin, the 18th and early 19th-century historian, whose volumes on Russian history became classics in their time:

At the parties I gave, Dostoevsky showed himself to be a charming person. He told his stories, and he displayed his wit and humor, as well as his unusual and original way of thinking. As a new person entered the room, however, Dostoevsky became silent for a moment and looked like a snail retreating into its shell, or like a silent and evil-looking pagan idol. And this lasted until the newcomer produced a good impression on him…. If the stranger engaged Dostoevsky in conversation, one generally heard him make some rude remark, or saw a sour look on his face.

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AT her lovely blog, Resting in Apricity, Casey Ann wrote earlier this summer of her trip to Paris. She was traveling as part of a study abroad program. Below is a snapshot she took in the Louvre. Her tour guide described a group of people protesting homosexual marriage as “the archaic people,” to which Casey Ann took exception.

Apricity, by the way, is the warmth of the sun in winter.

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A New Zealand couple who refused to allow two lesbians to sleep in a double bed at their bed and breakfast, as previously discussed here, has formally apologized to the women as part of the settlement of a complaint against them before the New Zealand Human Rights Commission.

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HERE is an interesting piece in the New York Times this morning about the rejection of a women’s rights bill in Afghanistan. The article by Azam Ahmed and Habib Zahori (typical bylines for an American newspaper) describes the Muslims who rejected the law, and see it as Western imperialism, simply as “conservatives.” From the piece:

Even in Kabul, one of the most liberal cities in Afghanistan, many young men and women express beliefs that fly in the face of the messages coming from American Embassy outreach efforts. Censorship, particularly when it comes to religious offenses, summons little ire. Many consider democracy a tool of the West. And the vast majority of Afghans still rely on tribal justice, viewing the courts as little more than venues of extortion.

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FOSTER parents in Massachusetts must undergo ten hours a year of “LGBT sensitivity training” and state workers are “weeding out” foster and adoptive parents who disapprove of homosexuality. See Amy Contrada’s report at Renew America.

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