Bill Kassel's Blog

Occasional reflections on religion, culture, politics, and anything else that comes into my mind...

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Moral Choices & Actions

It’s Still All About the Babies

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A DAY OF REMEMBRANCE
FOR ABORTED CHILDREN

Few things stir passionate debate, bitter feelings, and all-’round ill will more than abortion.

It’s fascinating — in a sad sort of way — to observe the stark and total contrast in views on this contentious issue. For some, abortion represents the ultimate safeguard of a woman’s freedom to find happiness and individual human fulfillment. For others it is the ultimate betrayal of our deepest and most sacred human values.

What is too often overlooked in this conflict of human absolutes is the reality of the small human who is sacrificed.

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The Trusting Prayer

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THAT EVIL MAY BE DEFEATED
AND THAT RIGHT MAY PREVAIL

It’s hard to know how to pray these days.

The country is in such turmoil, and clearly, we need God’s help. But I find it hard to keep my daily supplication from sounding like a blog post (like my last blog post, for instance).

I know God cares about our welfare. But does He care about our politics?

How do I implore His benevolence, without presuming He endorses my particular agenda?

What’s the proper way to frame my appeal to One whose perspective is eternal and all-encompassing?

The cute graphic above — currently circulating online — hints at the difficulty of keeping willfulness from imposing itself on prayer. Apparently a lot of people face this challenge.

I suspect the answer to my quandary lies in trust. Which is to say: in trusting that God knows what’s best, and assenting to His will, no matter how He permits things to work out.

Easier said than done, I’m afraid.

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Holy Attire — Examined

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DRESSING FOR CHURCH
IS A VERY HOT TOPIC

Last Saturday’s post — in which I raised the issue of wearing slovenly and/or immodest clothing at Mass — really struck a chord.

Each of the Facebook pages and discussion groups to which I linked the article has brimmed over with “Likes.” I’ve had more hits on this piece than any other essay in the history of my blog. Numerous comments have been posted all over.

Obviously, feelings about this topic are strong.

Most people agree with the point made by both Deacon John Amthor and myself that worship attire could stand some improvement.

But not everybody.

One objector put his view quite succinctly…

“Bullsh-t. Come as you are. God don’t care about how you dress. God cares about your heart.”

He saw the idea of applying standards to our physical appearance as a “doctrine of man,” which he rejects.

Another reader — named Lamont — had a similar edge to his critique, but he offered it with considerably more wit…

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Holy Attire

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LET’S TRY TO LOOK
DECENT IN CHURCH

When I was a kid attending a Presbyterian church, people dressed to the nines for Sunday service. Ladies wore hats. Gents came in suits. Little girls carried their collection money in their lace-trimmed white gloves. Little boys wore ties — grudgingly — and did their best to keep shirt tails tucked in.

Well…that was the 50s and early 60s. Times have changed.

When I began attending Catholic Mass, I was taken aback to see slacks on the women, open-neck knit shirts on the guys. That was the 70s. Things have gone completely to hell since then.

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The Deaths of the Innocents

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MEMORIAL DAY IS A GOOD TIME FOR
CAREFUL THINKING ABOUT TERRORISM

The carnage at that Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England has brought forth some really stupid statements. For instance, interviewed by Anderson Cooper on CNN, terrorism analyst Paul Cruickshank shared that…

“in recent months in Europe there’s been a number of false flag plots where right-wing extremists have tried to frame Islamists for terrorism.”

Blessedly, Cruickshank didn’t carry this line of speculation too far. Somehow, a guy named Salman Abedi blowing himself up with a bunch of innocent little girls didn’t have a right-wing feel about it.

Perhaps the stupidest pronouncement came from Katy Perry, a member of that exalted sisterhood of pop divas to which Ariana Grande belongs…

“No barriers, no borders, we all just need to co-exist.”

Okay, Katy. I’ll ignore the implied slam at Trump’s border wall and just suggest that you and all your sister pop tarts go over to Syria, look up the ISIS guys, and deliver your impassioned plea to them.

Let me know how that turns out.

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The Coulter Effect

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BLOCKING ANN COULTER
IS HAVING CONSEQUENCES

Ann Coulter is a force of nature.

I had occasion to interview her once, sitting in as guest host on Ave Maria Radio’s flagship talk show, “Kresta In the Afternoon.” I asked her an opening question, the content of which escapes me now.

And that was that. She was off to the races.

Who can remember what she said? It didn’t really matter at the time, and it doesn’t matter today. She was just being Ann Coulter, dominating the twenty-or-so minutes of our interview.

This is the inimitable Ann Coulter style: a barrage of ideas, pointed observations, and inflammatory lines, fired at machine gun speed. It’s how she’s made her name.

The nation is blessed that her fusillades are made on behalf of conservative ideals. If her political/philosophical bent was toward the left, she’d be a genuine threat.

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Back to the Ashes

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IT’S GOOD TO REMIND OURSELVES
OF OUR FLAWS AND FAILINGS

Ash Wednesday kicked of Lent last week. Perhaps some thoughts I posted back in 2014 would be of interest…

____________

I have to confess that there are certain Catholic pious practices I don’t entirely get.

It probably reflects the fact that I’m an adult convert and wasn’t raised in the Church — or that I’ve made less progress on my spiritual journey than I like to assume.

One of the things I don’t get is fasting.

As I understand it, the Church advocates self-denial as a way of detaching ourselves from fleshly preoccupations. Yet I’m never more preoccupied with concerns of the flesh (that is to say, eating) than when I deny myself food.

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A Journalistic Ideal

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TRUMP GAVE THE MEDIA
AN OVERDUE SCOLDING

You think Donald Trump is exaggerating when he complains about the media being biased against him? Here’s Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts…

“Dear Mr. So-Called President:

“So let me explain to you how this works.

“You were elected as chief executive of the United States. I won’t belabor the fact that you won with a minority of the popular vote and a little help from your friends, FBI Director James Comey and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The bottom line is, you were elected.

“And this does entitle you to certain things. You get your own airplane. You get free public housing. You get greeted with snappy salutes. And a band plays when you walk into the room.

“But there is one thing to which your election does not entitle you. It does not entitle you to do whatever pops into your furry orange head without being called on it or, should it run afoul of the Constitution, without being blocked.”

Now, Pitts is certainly correct when he says Presidents shouldn’t do things that “run afoul of the Constitution.” I don’t see that anything Trump has done so far rises to this level of concern, but the point is well taken.

HOWEVER — can you imagine the furor that would have ensued if a nationally syndicated columnist (of any ethnicity) had addressed Barack Obama as “Mr. So-Called President” or mocked any thoughts germinating inside the Obamian head by describing its color and hair texture?

Just ponder that for a moment.

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Book Bind

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EVEN JESUS’ RELATIVES
ARE NOT SCAM-FREE

Today’s high-tech pirates will use anything in their nefarious schemes. I’ve discovered that some bad characters are using my novel about the family of Jesus.

If you should stumble onto an alleged free book site designated “ePm.eBook,” that displays the cover of my novel, do not — repeat, DO NOT! — click on any of the links or buttons. You won’t get a free copy of MY BROTHER’S KEEPER.

What you will get is malware that can foul up your computer or co-opt it for some unknown wicked purpose.

I suppose, in a perverted sort of way, this is a testament to my book’s appeal. But I hate to think of playing even an innocent part in causing harm.

When I discovered the “ePm.eBook” site, I contacted my eBook distributer. A tech-support agent advised…

“This is not a legitimate outlet. It’s an automatically generated page created by internet trolls using publicly available information off of Amazon or other sites. They don’t actually have the book, they just put up a ‘free download’ button to trick people into clicking download and inviting all sorts of malware and viruses onto their computer. Your best bet for combating this is to report them to Google and have them remove it from their search indexes.”

I’m doing that. But “ePm.eBook” or some other version of this scam will likely just pop up under a different name, and my book could appear again.

So be careful.

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The Prophet

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HIS WIN WAS DOWNRIGHT RELIGIOUS
CAN HE SATISFY THE HOPES RAISED?

Let’s be honest. Relieved as we are that the nation’s leftward march has been interrupted — and despite expectations of positive change — there’s no denying that the Trump Era is beginning in deep uncertainty.

We’ve come through a very odd election that offered a choice between two candidates with unusually high negative poll numbers. And while I believe that people decided early on how they were going to vote, most still went into the booth with conflicted feelings.

As I observed in a blog post back in August…

“…Republicans and Democrats alike don’t really support either candidate. Rather, they feel they must cast their ballots against either Clinton or Trump — choosing to oppose the one they’re most desperate to keep from winning….

“…this year, people really aren’t voting to elect their favorite candidate. They’re voting to avoid their worst nightmare.”

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La La Land

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TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME
IS AN EPIDEMIC IN HOLLYWOOD

A recent bomb threat at one of the U.S.-Canada border crossing stations set me onto a bit of fantasy conjecture…

“Canadians aren’t fools,” I said to myself upon reading a report of the incident. “This is a warning to all those movie stars and celebrities who threated to go north if Trump got elected.”

Hey, it’s not all that implausible. Canada has its own crackpot entertainment industry. They don’t need to import ours.

As noted by Breitbart News…

“Rosie O’Donnell, Debra Messing, Ed Asner and Michael Shannon are among the dozens of artists, entertainers, and activists who have attached their names to an effort calling for a month-long protest to stop President-elect Donald Trump.

“‘No! In the Name of Humanity We Refuse to Accept a Fascist America!’ reads a full-page ad placed in the New York Times on Wednesday by the group Refuse Fascism.”

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