Monday, May 5, 2008

Shedding The Green Blood Of The Silent Animals



A Switzerland ethics committee has begun a debate to try and argue for those who cannot speak for themselves. Is it the defense of the unborn from creation and extermination as part of the "designer child" mentality? Or perhaps a criticism of the abortion industry for targeting minorities? Maybe it's an attempt to get parents to stop late-term aborting their children for cleft palates?

No, my friends. The ethics committee is arguing that:
"plants deserve the right to life and that killing them is morally wrong except when it comes to saving humans. In a report on "the dignity of the creature in the plant world", the federal Ethics Committee on non-human Gene Technology condemned the decapitation of flowers without reason."
Often truth is stranger than fiction. However, sometimes truth is exactly as strange as a particular piece of fiction. G.K. Chesterton seems to have won his own game of "Cheat the Prophet" on this one, judging by this passage from 1904's The Napoleon of Notting Hill:"
"...Mr. Mick not only became a vegetarian, but at length declared vegetarianism doomed (‘shedding,’ as he called it finely, ‘the green blood of the silent animals’), and predicted that men in a better age would live on nothing but salt. And then came the pamphlet from Oregon (where the thing was tried), the pamphlet called ‘Why should Salt suffer?’ and there was more trouble."
I'm wondering what exactly they're eating for dinner over there in Switzerland...

Sunday, May 4, 2008

A Face Like The Face Of Robert Tilton Without The Horns, Part X: Do You Still Get To Claim An Audience If They're Not There To See You?

The pope hates the Bible. That's why he kisses it, elevates it, and processes around the altar with it, just before reading it to you.

Most interesting is the point about halfway through, where one street preacher leans over to the other street preacher and says, "we should start preaching off of what he says." Things become strangely quiet on their end at that point...

Things That Make John Wycliffe Look Harmless, Part X: The Birthday Bible



It's a decent idea, but you can only read the thing once a year.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

Upon The Feast Of St. Joseph The Worker



Joseph, by the work of your hands
and the sweat of your brow,
you supported Jesus and Mary,
and had the Son of God as your fellow worker.

Teach me to work as you did,
with patience and perseverance, for God and
for those whom God has given me to support.
Teach me to see in my fellow workers
the Christ who desires to be in them,
that I may always be charitable and forbearing
towards all.

Grant me to look upon work
with the eyes of faith,
so that I shall recognize in it
my share in God's own creative activity
and in Christ's work of our redemption,
and so take pride in it.

When it is pleasant and productive,
remind me to give thanks to God for it.
And when it is burdensome,
teach me to offer it to God,
in reparation for my sins
and the sins of the world.

optional refrain: "take that, commies!"