King of Kings

"That may be why we hear so much about "theocracy" coming from the left. Christ is the King who sets His subjects free: not only from the bonds of sin, but also from the bonds of sinners. To the extent that men acknowledge Christ as King, they will submit themselves to the liberating laws of virtue; they will more readily obey legitimate government, and in general not need a whole lot of governing, and will more readily rebel against laws that are no laws, as Aquinas puts it. Sheep in the fold, and soldiers in the field -- that is what they will be. But if you are a member of the governing class, and you do not acknowledge your King, you will resent the constraint upon your "freedom" to constrain the legitimate freedom of everybody else. You want to clone human beings, although most of your little subjects find it appalling; and the King blocks your way. You want to redefine marriage, against the judgment of your little subjects; and again the King blocks your way. You want to engineer the future by dictating what shall be taught to all children, by whom, and how; and there stands the King, cordoned by the little ones whom He has called to Himself. The King's sheep are soldiers too; but you don't want those sheep, you want your own"
-Anthony Esolen

Rhetoric vs. Reality

"More frightening than any particular beliefs or policies is an utter lack of any sense of a need to test those beliefs and policies against hard evidence. Mistakes can be corrected by those who pay attention to facts but dogmatism will not be corrected by those who are wedded to a vision.

One of the most pervasive political visions of our time is the vision of liberals as compassionate and conservatives as less caring. It is liberals who advocate "forgiveness" of loans to Third World countries, a "living wage" for the poor and a "safety net" for all.

But these are all government policies -- not individual acts of compassion -- and the actual empirical consequences of such policies are of remarkably little interest to those who advocate them. Depending on what those consequences are, there may be good reasons to oppose them, so being for or against these policies may tell us nothing about who is compassionate or caring and who is not."
-Thomas Sowell

Happy Thanksgiving!

God has been exceedingly good to me this past year. This was my first year here in the Northeast and I cherish every one of my new friends along with my old friends from around the country. God bless us, everyone!

Seriously, I love to bake (wanna make something of it???)...so here is the recipe I use for the Pumpkin Roll. Malayalee people seem to LOVE this and it's actually much simpler than you'd think. Check it out:

Pumpkin Roll with Cream Cheese Filling

INGREDIENTS:

• 3 Eggs
• 1 cup Sugar
• 2/3 cup Pumpkin
• 1 teaspoon Lemon juice
• 3/4 cup All-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon Baking powder
• 2 teaspoons Cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon Ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon Nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon Salt
• .
• Filling:
• 8 ounces Cream cheese -- softened
• 4 tablespoons Butter -- or margarine
• 1 cup Powdered sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon Vanilla

PREPARATION:

in large bowl, combine eggs and sugar, beating well. Add pumpkin and lemon juice, mixing until blended.

In separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, spices and salt. Add to egg mixture, mixing well.

Spread batter into greased and waxed-paper lined 10-by-15-inch jelly-roll pan.

Bake at 350 ° for 15 minutes. Remove from oven. Cool for 15 minutes. Place cake on clean tea towel sprinkled liberally with powdered sugar. Cool 10 minutes longer. From 10- inch side, roll cake up in towel. Set aside.

While cake is cooling in towel, prepare filling. Beat together cream cheese and butter; stir in powdered sugar and vanilla and blend until smooth.
Unroll cake. Evenly spread filling over cake. Roll up cake (without the towel). Wrap in plastic wrap. Cover and chill at least 1 hour. Slice before serving. Keep leftover slices refrigerated. This pumpkin roll freezes well.

Pilgrims Reject Socialism

Excellent article I read last Thanksgiving:

"Recalling the story of the Pilgrims is a Thanksgiving tradition, but do you know the real story behind their triumph over hunger and poverty at Plymouth Colony nearly four centuries ago? Their salvation stemmed not so much from the charitable gestures of local Indians, but from their courageous decision to embrace the free-market principle of private property ownership a century and a half before Adam Smith wrote The Wealth of Nations."-
Michael Franc

Religion Just Doesn't Go Away

Now imagine two groups of people -- let's call them the Secular Tribe and the Religious Tribe -- who subscribe to one of these two views. Which of the two is more likely to survive, prosper and multiply? The religious tribe is made up of people who have an animating sense of purpose. The secular tribe is made up of people who are not sure why they exist at all. The religious tribe is composed of individuals who view their every thought and action as consequential. The secular tribe is made up of matter that cannot explain why it is able to think at all.

Should evolutionists like Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and Wilson be surprised, then, to see that religious tribes are flourishing around the world? Across the globe, religious faith is thriving and religious people are having more children. By contrast, atheist conventions only draw a handful of embittered souls, and the atheist lifestyle seems to produce listless tribes that cannot even reproduce themselves.
-Dinesh Dsouza

Bad Ideas for Evangelism

Jesus Bobble-heads!

They're tackling Jesus!!!

The Analogy of the Pencil

Let God be God

"
And for me to let God be God, I must put up with the fact everyone around me is the Other, and they bear the image of the One Philanthropist. I must put up with the fact that all the pagan gods, Apollonian and Dionysian, find their germ in my soul, and thus the Enemy of God is not, immediately, the devil, but me. I must put up with the fact that the only alternative to Enemy of God is Slave to Christ.

Slave, and friend.

Let God be God.

Or, as we might say better, and more completely, in the dark of the night and the light of the Son, “Let God arise, and let His enemies be scattered.”
"
-Second Terrace

Milton Friedman

1912-2006

Tolerance, Elton John Style!

On Sunday, November 12, Sir Elton told interviewer Jake Shears (a performer with the group “Scissor Sisters”) that he wants to see an organized effort to suppress institutionalized faith. “From my point of view I would ban religion completely,” the superstar declared, “even though there are some wonderful things about it…. But the reality is that organized religion doesn’t seem to work. It turns people into hateful lemmings and it’s not really compassionate.”
-Michael Medved

So, Elton, let's take away religion completely. Will atheism be altogether more compassionate and tolerant then naught? Look at the great atheistic regimes (Soviet Union, China, Cuba, etc.) and see how well a religious-less society frees people from a fate of being a "hateful lemming." Face it, atheism is just as dogmatic and institutionalized as "religion." There are fundamental and unquestioned doctrines used by the demagogues: equality, tolerance, a twisted notion of freedom, along with a zealous irreligious evangelism manifested in bodies like the ACLU. Frankly, without religion and the inherited systems of our forebears, we don't even know what wrong and right actually is.

Don't get burned out on Christmas before December!!!

Every year around now, I can see Thanksgiving up ahead and Christmas not far behind. In fact yesterday, I saw several Christmas..err.."Holiday"-themed commercials, and candy canes being sold at the grocery store. So we've gone straight from Halloween to Christmas, and it's barely mid-November. I for one, have burned out on Christmas cheer before December before; listening to Christmas music, watching Christmas specials, seeing Christmas decorations. This year....no more! I'm boycotting listening to more than 2 (It's hard to resist) Christmas songs a day before at least Thanksgiving. Sheesh...Thanksgiving's actually its own holiday, not just the pre-Christmas Party. Let's dress like pilgrims this year!

Evangelical Stereotypes

This article doesn't really offer a precise definition of "evangelicals." The term "protestant" could describe a broad spectrum of Christianity. Would socially conservative Catholics and Orthodox also be put under the Evangelical umbrella. They certainly would vote the same way.
-Steve

"Whether or not that's true, these evangelicals -- Bible-believing and socially conservative -- are redefining social justice. They're mindful of the material conditions that breed poverty and despair, but they emphasize spiritual rebirth. Though willing to partner with government agencies, they prefer to work at the grass roots, one family at a time.

Meanwhile, churches and faith-based organizations are growing enormously in their international outreach. Groups such as World Vision are often the first responders to natural disasters. The Association of Evangelical Relief and Development Organizations, founded in 1978, now boasts 47 member groups in dozens of countries. As anyone familiar with these organizations knows, they help people regardless of creed, race or sexual orientation -- another democratic (and evangelical) ideal.

It is surely no thirst for theocracy but rather a love for their neighbor that sends American evangelicals into harm's way: into refugee camps in Sudan; into AIDS clinics in Somalia, South Africa and Uganda; into brothels to help women forced into sexual slavery; and into prisons and courts to advocate for the victims of political and religious repression."
-Joseph Loconte & Michael Cromartie

Parumala Perunal 2006

Pray for us, St. Gregorios of Parumala!