SISTER Margaret A. Farley, of the Sisters of Mercy of America, has been officially denounced by the Vatican for her 2006 book, Just Love: A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics, which argues in favor of same-sex marriage, divorce and masturbation, reports The New York Times. The Congregation for the Doctrine of its Faith took two years to review the book. The wheels of Vatican censure grind exceedingly slow. Sister Farley said in response:

I can only clarify that the book was not intended to be an expression of current official Catholic teaching, nor was it aimed specifically against this teaching. It is of a different genre altogether.

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The Clove, Catskills (1827)

THOMAS COLE, considered the father of American landscape painting, only lived to age 47, but left a large body of works, which are in museums across the country today. These works include his favorite genre of allegorical paintings, as well as the romantic landscape scenes for which he is most famous. You can read a short biography of him here.

JESSE POWELL writes:

Looking at fertility of white women in America over the past 40 years, we see the development of a sharp divergence between college-educated and non-college-educated women.

In 1970, the fertility patterns of college-educated women, who represented a much smaller proportion of the overall female population, didn’t differ much from the non-college-educated.

Both groups of women had a strong preference for having their children young, before they were 30. Delaying childbearing until later in life was not common in either group. Also, illegitimacy was low for both.

Much has changed since. The group of college-educated women has expanded dramatically and a sharp disparity has developed  between the fertility of the non-college-educated, who account for more than 60 percent of all births, and the educated.

The non-college-educated woman in 2009 is more prone to delay having children until 30 than the college-educated woman was in 1970. And, among the college-educated, the desire to have children before 30, which was very strong in 1970, almost completely disappeared by 2009. Also, overall fertility has dropped greatly among both groups of women.

The high school dropout in 1970 had an illegitimacy ratio of ten percent while the esteemed college graduate had an illegitimacy ratio of only one percent; the ratio for the high school graduate was four percent. Read More »

I AM behind in posting comments and adding new posts due to the illness of a relative, a death in the family (the oldest son of my maternal grandfather, whom I wrote about here, died last week), and other matters. I hope to catch up today.

THE website Gulag Bound recently featured two interesting essays on The Hunger Games by Berit Kjos. She reviews both the book and the movie. Kjos writes:

I heard no laughter while watching The Hunger Games on opening day. Just sober silence. This teenage movie — set in a totalitarian world that supposedly replaced a broken America — shows the grim struggle for survival in a world without God, hope or meaning. The only “higher power” is a heartless government that supplies its own choice of artificial thrills and trials. And the people suffer.

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HERE is an outstanding video, posted at Heteroseparatist.com and made by the organization SaveCalifornia.com in response to the elevation of homosexual activist Harvey Milk to an official role model for children. Harvey Milk Day is May 22 in California schools.

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Virgin and Child, Hans Memling (1475) Metropolitan Museum

HERE’S a forthright fifteenth-century painting by Hans Memling of Jesus Christ at the breast. Why is this so radically different from the recent photos of nursing women that have gained international attention, leaving aside the obvious fact that this painting represents the imaginary vision of an artist?

There is one overwhelming difference, and that is the gravity of Mary’s expression, a mixture of serenity, love and sorrow. Also, the tender way she clasps the Holy Child, as if he is a priceless treasure, is entirely different from the manner of the mother on Time magazine who stared self-assertively at the camera while her older son stood on a stool, or the soldier who appeared in a military uniform while feeding her daughters, or Crystal Scott, below, who feeds her daughter in public on a street and gazes with heavily blackened eyes at the camera with what appears to be an explicit come-on. Mary is all-encompassing maternity. The others are flagrant show-offs.

CONVERSION THERAPY, which helps homosexuals battle same-sex desires, was banned yesterday by California State Senate in another blatant political endorsement of a lifestyle that causes suicide, disease and depression. A lengthy response by Christopher H. Rosik, Ph.D. of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality can be found here.

Randy Thomasson of SaveCalifornia.com, said the bill would keep effective treatment from adolescents who have been sexually abused.

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ONCE AGAIN, we have a mother in a shameless pose breastfeeding for the public. In this case, Terran Echegoyen-McCabe, a soldier in the National Guard, is pictured in uniform breastfeeding her twins, supposedly to raise awareness for breastfeeding. (Another military woman is pictured with her in a more modest pose.)

What does the world think of America? Echegoyen-McCabe (who but a feminist would adopt such a ridiculous name?) is a symbol of a military in steep decline.

And breastfeeding is transformed, from maternal selflessness to one more nauseating display of self-assertion.

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MR. TALL writes:

There’s an interesting book by New York Times reporter Michael Sokolove called Warrior Girls that documents the staggering rates at which girls playing seemingly ‘safe’ sports such as soccer and basketball suffer both ACL tears and concussions. Sokolove intersperses his research data with the sad stories of girls who have undergone repeated surgeries and painful, tedious rehabilitation, only to be reinjured and left essentially crippled for life. One theme he explores is the way in which girls, consumed by team spirit, loyalty and eagerness to please parents and coaches, push themselves through pain harder than many boys would ever do.

As you might expect of a Times employee, however, Sokolove quickly dons his PC Safety Blinders when it comes time to draw conclusions from his findings. He also wastes many pages of the book extolling the Monument to Justice that is Title IX.

 I’ve reviewed it briefly here, if anyone’s interested.

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THOMAS BERTONNEAU, in an excellent essay at The Orthosphere, defines scientism for his university students. Scientism, he explains, is a captivating narrative, viewed as absolute, unquestionable truth by its adherents. Though it sees itself as an enemy of superstition, scientism is beset with superstitions of its own. Bertonneau writes:

Like any ideology, scientism always perceives itself as threatened by its enemy, “superstition.” It can never rest on its laurels but always sees devils popping up in the garden of its utopia. Read More »

AT The Orthosphere, Bonald briefly considers the liberal belief that to identify with one’s own ethnic group or race is to hate others. He writes: Read More »

ENACTED 40 years ago, Title IX has institutionalized sex discrimination in college sports, requiring colleges to kill male athletic teams in the pursuit of equality. The federal government has done everything possible to make women into gladiators and men into couch potatoes. But there is one thing Title IX can’t do. It can’t force fans to like women’s sports.

Megan Greenwell, a character in an Evelyn Waugh novel, oops, I mean, a blogger at Good News, says fans are not doing their share:

Supporting Title IX’s ideals requires supporting women’s sports at all levels. Too many soccer fans were content to celebrate Brandi Chastain’s and Hope Solo’s accomplishments on the international stage but not at home. Too many basketball fans condemn the women’s game as “boring” without ever having attended a game. [emphasis added]

People who have never been to a women’s soccer game should be sent to labor camps.

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IN THE latest post on immodesty, a college professor agrees with my position that feminism and a hypersexualized environment have robbed many well-intentioned women of basic common sense.

J.N. writes:

I don’t doubt that some women dress immodestly out of aggressiveness, but I agree that most women probably do so out of lack of awareness.  This happens because feminist social opprobrium and sexual harassment law have prevented the natural male response to immodest dress from occurring. Young women think they are merely being “pretty” because they are no longer exposed to what really goes on in a man’s mind. Read More »

JESSE POWELL writes:

What has been the most enduring hallmark of the rise of women in the public sphere and the attendant deterioration of the private sphere? It is the greater propensity of women to work for monetary compensation. Ever since 1870, when data collection on this subject began, women have worked for money more and more with each passing decade.

Things changed, however, in the year 2000, more precisely in April 2000; that month marked the high water mark of women’s workforce participation. Among all women, 25 to 54 years old, 77.3 percent were in the Labor Force in April 2000; the equivalent ratio for men for that month was 91.7 percent. (These data come from the Current Population Survey; Current Population Survey data on labor force participation tends to be a bit higher than data given by the Census.)

The first available data on women’s labor force participation comes from the 1870 Census. In 1870, 13.1 percent of all females over the age of 10 worked; that proportion rose to 14.7 percent in 1880 and 17.0 percent in 1890. Looking at females aged 16 and over 16.0 percent worked in 1880, 18.6 percent (estimated) worked in 1890, and 20.6 percent worked in 1900. Read More »

Bernard Montgomery, left, and Meyrick Clifton James Source: The Australian

I WAS MONTY’S DOUBLE, a British movie made in 1958 and directed by John Guillermin, is the story of a mostly unsuccessful military actor commissioned to impersonate General Bernard Montgomery during World War II. Meyrick Clifton James, the actor, plays himself in the movie and he is outstanding. It’s a truly remarkable performance. From a 2010 piece in The Australian:

IN 1944 a washed-up Australian actor named Meyrick Clifton James experienced one of the oddest career revivals in history.

James was not a great actor. He could neither sing nor dance, and he had lost a finger in the trenches during World War I. When war broke out again he volunteered to entertain the troops, winding up in Leicester, in the Army Pay Corps Variety Troupe. With his thin face and grey moustache he could do a remarkable impersonation of the top British soldier, Bernard Montgomery.

On the eve of D-Day the failed actor was plucked from obscurity to play the starring role in one of the war’s most melodramatic deception: as Monty’s double.

Here is a clip at Turner Classic Movies. The movie also stars one of the most hardworking British movie actors of all time, John Mills.

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JAMES H. writes:

My father grew up in south St. Louis. He’s 91. These old south St. Louis neighborhoods are exactly as Alan writes. They nurtured the soul and gave sustenance to the individual as part of a community and a people. There was a connectedness that has long since been lost. But then this was by design. For when men realize that they are part of a family, a community, a people and a nation of shared ethnicity, historical experience, values, religion and culture they grow more completely human. They are energized and strengthened by the whole rather than alienated and disconnected. Read More »

DIANA writes:

Would that I had read James Bowman’s perceptive review of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. I would have saved myself and a friend $6 a piece, and spent the morning in the beauties of nature rather than the tedium of a witless British “comedy.”

Mr. Bowman nails the movie’s disrespect towards both its British and Indian characters. I will write more to you about this film when my temper has cooled. For now, I feel cheated. A waste of a stellar cast.

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