Bravo, Linda Gibbons
Linda Gibbons is a Canadian who has stood for Life, no matter what it has cost her. Read her story and be renewed in your own purpose…
Who Wears the Pants
In most American homes, it is the woman.
“Across all decision-making realms, it tilts to the woman,” noted Rich Morin, the Pew study’s lead author. “I was surprised by the percentage of men who made none of the decisions in any of the areas. A significant percentage were just bystanders.” Not surprisingly, one reason men say they are willing to acquiesce in their spouses’ wishes is that their wives usually have greater knowledge of the day-to-day activities and needs of the home than they do. They trust their wives’ choices the way they would any specialist’s. But what is rather unexpected is the deeper (and much sweeter) reason men have for giving in to their wives: They want them to be happy, or at least they don’t want to be responsible for making them unhappy.
The general consensus of sociologists is that, whereas a woman’s marital satisfaction is dependent on a combination of economic, emotional and psychological realities, a man’s marital satisfaction is most determined by one factor: how happy his wife is. When she is happy, he is. Working within this framework, most husbands are unwilling to dig in their heels on any issue unless they have a tremendous incentive to do so.
Pray for Orissa
Hindus in the Indian state of Orissa have been on a murderous rampage against Christians over the past few weeks. I’ve been following the story, but have not posted about it (or anything lately). Still, it is important to pray for our persecuted brothers and sisters, and so I offer a few links for anyone with me on their feed reader.
The best recent summary: Christians Face Hindus Wrath, by Emily Wax of The Washington Post.
A previous roundup of links in the breaking days of the story: Mild Case of Christian-versus-Hindu Violence, by Terry Mattingly of GetReligion.org (a religious media critique, more links in the comments).
An Ideal Husband
I’m not in the habit of favorably quoting Maureen Dowd, but you’ve got to give folks their due when they do well. I think the following NYT op-ed is worth reading…
An Ideal Husband by Maureen Dowd, Published: July 6, 2008, NYT
This weekend, we celebrate our great American pastime: messy celebrity divorces.
There’s the Christie Brinkley/Peter Cook fireworks on Long Island and the Madonna/Guy Ritchie/A-Rod Roman candle in New York.
So how do you avoid a relationship where you end up saying, “The man who I was living with, I just didn’t know who he was” — as Brinkley did in court when talking about her husband’s $3,000-a-month Internet porn and swinger site habit? (Not to mention the 18-year-old mistress/assistant.)
Father Pat Connor, a 79-year-old Catholic priest born in Australia and based in Bordentown, N.J., has spent his celibate life — including nine years as a missionary in India — mulling connubial bliss. His decades of marriage counseling led him to distill some “mostly common sense” advice about how to dodge mates who would maul your happiness.
“Hollywood says you can be deeply in love with someone and then your marriage will work,” the twinkly eyed, white-haired priest says. “But you can be deeply in love with someone to whom you cannot be successfully married.”
For 40 years, he has been giving a lecture — “Whom Not to Marry” — to high school seniors, mostly girls because they’re more interested.
“It’s important to do it before they fall seriously in love, because then it will be too late,” he explains. “Infatuation trumps judgment.”
I asked him to summarize his talk:
“Never marry a man who has no friends,” he starts. “This usually means that he will be incapable of the intimacy that marriage demands. I am always amazed at the number of men I have counseled who have no friends. Since, as the Hebrew Scriptures say, ‘Iron shapes iron and friend shapes friend,’ what are his friends like? What do your friends and family members think of him? Sometimes, your friends can’t render an impartial judgment because they are envious that you are beating them in the race to the altar. Envy beclouds judgment.
“Does he use money responsibly? Is he stingy? Most marriages that founder do so because of money — she’s thrifty, he’s on his 10th credit card.
“Steer clear of someone whose life you can run, who never makes demands counter to yours. It’s good to have a doormat in the home, but not if it’s your husband.
“Is he overly attached to his mother and her mythical apron strings? When he wants to make a decision, say, about where you should go on your honeymoon, he doesn’t consult you, he consults his mother. (I’ve known cases where the mother accompanies the couple on their honeymoon!)
“Does he have a sense of humor? That covers a multitude of sins. My mother was once asked how she managed to live harmoniously with three men — my father, brother and me. Her answer, delivered with awesome arrogance, was: ‘You simply operate on the assumption that no man matures after the age of 11.’ My father fell about laughing.
“A therapist friend insists that ‘more marriages are killed by silence than by violence.’ The strong, silent type can be charming but ultimately destructive. That world-class misogynist, Paul of Tarsus, got it right when he said, ‘In all your dealings with one another, speak the truth to one another in love that you may grow up.’
“Don’t marry a problem character thinking you will change him. He’s a heavy drinker, or some other kind of addict, but if he marries a good woman, he’ll settle down. People are the same after marriage as before, only more so.
“Take a good, unsentimental look at his family — you’ll learn a lot about him and his attitude towards women. Kay made a monstrous mistake marrying Michael Corleone! Is there a history of divorce in the family? An atmosphere of racism, sexism or prejudice in his home? Are his goals and deepest beliefs worthy and similar to yours? I remember counseling a pious Catholic woman that it might not be prudent to marry a pious Muslim, whose attitude about women was very different. Love trumped prudence; the annulment process was instigated by her six months later.
“Imagine a religious fundamentalist married to an agnostic. One would have to pray that the fundamentalist doesn’t open the Bible and hit the page in which Abraham is willing to obey God and slit his son’s throat.
“Finally: Does he possess those character traits that add up to a good human being — the willingness to forgive, praise, be courteous? Or is he inclined to be a fibber, to fits of rage, to be a control freak, to be envious of you, to be secretive?
“After I regale a group with this talk, the despairing cry goes up: ‘But you’ve eliminated everyone!’ Life is unfair.”
Abstinence Promotes Childhood Sex
I am both amused and bothered when I catch “news” stories that make a causal connection between rising childhood/teen sexual conduct and “abstinence” education. There are no reliable studies that demonstrate that abstinence education is any less effective than other sex-ed options.
It also matters how you define “abstinence education.” Some programs are abstinence-only, others emphasize a preference for abstinence, others include honest discussions of abstinence with other sex-ed information. Often, reporters unquestioningly include anti-abstinence quotes with no context or definition.
Take a recent example from FOXNews: STDs Run Rampant at Pa. School District, CDC Steps In
It’s estimated that 10 percent of the 3,000 middle and high school students in the Delaware Valley School District in Milford, P.A., are infected with an STD — including one confirmed case of HIV, Times Herald Record reported Friday.
A non-profit health clinic in Milford said they estimate more than 300 students contracted a sexually transmitted disease in the past year. Officials also told the paper students as young as 12 years old reported being sexually active.
Kristen Bruce, a nurse practitioner with the Milford clinic, said most of the cases were the human papillomavirus (HPV).
Bruce told the paper she wasn’t surprised by the numbers, citing a recent CDC study that found at least one in four teenage girls nationwide, between the ages of 14 and 19, has a sexually transmitted disease.
First of all, some basic math. If 1 in 4 teen girls have an STD, then that is 25%. If only 10% of all Delaware Valley students (male and female) have an STD, then the school district is doing something very, very right in their sex-ed department.
But that is not the way Delaware Valley school officials see it:
The Board of Education is currently revising the health curriculum, which places heavy emphasis on abstinence.
Why change what is clearly working? Can we at least have a one-sentence explanation as to how the health curriculum emphasizes abstinence, and why it is relevant to the STD rates? Do the planned changes to the curriculum include eliminating the abstinence portion or will they strengthen the emphasis on abstinence? Aren’t reporters supposed to ask questions and determine facts?
One reason the DV Board of Ed is not patting themselves on the back for a job well done perhaps is because they know the CDC STD Study results are bogus. Seriously, is one out of four teenage girls you know suffering from an STD? In every homeroom of every grade in your local middle- and high-school, there are 5 girls with an STD. During every softball game at your local ballpark, six players are suffering from a sexually transmitted infection. Is this believable? Maybe so in some areas - but nation-wide? Wouldn’t you like some follow-up on how this statistic was calculated? Wouldn’t you like to know why the CDC identified this school district as high-risk at 10% if they really believed 26% of all female teenagers have an STD?
In a nutshell, researchers looked at the data of 600 girls from other sexual infection studies. They lumped everything they could under the category “STD” and did not differentiate between 14-year old freshmen and 19-year old barmaids. Viola! Every girl in junior high is in imminent danger. But there is no background or factual evaluation of the study cited. It is part of a “citation” by a health “official” and thus is simply allowed to stand as factual.
Speaking of officials qualified to dispense medical knowledge related to public policy - do no physicians work for the health clinic? Why is this nurse practitioner especially qualified to serve as a reliable source for questionable CDC information?
The reporter did find one physician who was willing to go on record:
Dr. Joseph Rahimian, an infectious disease specialist at St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York City…
[Rahimian said,] “There’s no study that abstinence is a highly effective form of prevention for any of these infections.”
(Interesting to note that there are no physicians in all of Pennsylvania. Perhaps that is why nurse practitioners carry so much authority there.)
Taking what we have, where did Dr. Rahimian go to medical school to learn that not having sex was anything other than a “highly effective form of prevention” for sexually transmitted diseases? I admit, I have not been to medical school, so perhaps there is a study that shows that people who don’t engage in sexual activity have equally high rates of sexually transmitted diseases as those people who do engage in sexual activity. For most of us laity, something about this claim just doesn’t add up. Does the reporter not understand the illogic of the good doctor’s statement?
The idea that STDs are rampant because there is just too much abstinence is madness to the Nth degree. This type of unquestioning, uncritical reporting is lunacy in print. Reprinting the unsupported claim that STDs are rampant because of “abstinence education” is shoddy, negligent reporting that (considering the ease with which our present report could have been clarified) borders on outright bias and advocacy journalism.
The real sadness is that so many readers uncritically accept it all as somehow true.
Journalistic Communion
GetReligion has a thoughtful post related to journalists and the religious observances they cover…
There are facts that matter here. Facts about history, doctrine and courtesy. Facts matter when you are covering religion news and trends. Facts matter when you are interviewing religious people — left and right, members of major world religions and members of lesser known bodies that some would be tempted to call “fringe.” Facts and doctrine matter to religious people, even to people who are very specific and highly creedal about the doctrines that they reject. I have interviewed many an atheist who had more doctrines in his anti-creed than I recite in the Nicene Creed.
This isn’t about emotions and feelings. It’s about getting the facts right and showing respect for the people for whom those facts, doctrines and rituals are a matter of eternal life and death. Facts matter in journalism, religion and journalism about religion. Amen.
and Amen.
Wedding Prices
She had a fabulous wedding on a budget
By Jen Haley
CNN
(CNN) — Michelle Cottle, 38, of Westchester, New York, always dreamed of an elegant wedding.
“I envisioned a large wedding, 200 guests… a big band sound, with the trumpets and a singer…the Frank Sinatra thing,” she says.
But then Michelle pauses and laughs. “And then I started to find out how much that would cost.”
Michelle and her fiancé, Jason Cohen, quickly realized that they had to make a choice: a down payment on a house or a dream wedding. For them, it was a no-brainer. The couple decided to keep their wedding budget to around $20,000.
That’s no easy feat, especially considering the cost of a wedding in the New York City area is about $46,000 according to a survey by The Knot Wedding Network. More broadly, the cost of an average wedding — not including the honeymoon — is about $28,000.
But you can walk down the aisle without declaring bankruptcy. To rein in your bridal budget, consider your timing.
Instead of having a Saturday night wedding, Michelle and Jason opted for a Saturday afternoon barbeque at a local mansion.
There were red bandana napkins and burlap tablecloths. Guests ate pulled duck, barbeque chicken, hot dogs, crab cakes, baked beans and corn bread. The highlight of the evening: the ice cream sundae bar.
“I didn’t want the wedding factory,” says Michelle. “We wanted personal feelings and elegance without it costing too much.”
Target where to save, where to splurge
You can save around 20 percent a person if you choose a Friday night, a Saturday afternoon or a Sunday wedding according to Divine Events Catering in Atlanta.
The most expensive part of a wedding is the reception. It’s at least a third of your budget according to Michelle Preli, editor in chief of Brides.com, a bridal resource Web site. It’s all about your priorities.
One of the biggest mistakes couples make in planning a wedding is not having a clear vision of their budget. That’s the best way to prioritize what you’ll spend money on, and where you can trim costs. There are options in every category, whether its invitations or flowers, says Preli. Spend less money and attention on things that aren’t very important to you.
Michelle and Jason knew exactly where they would loosen the purse strings: photography. “That was one area we didn’t want to scrimp on,” says Michelle.
To make sure you’re staying within your budget, check out the budget advisor at www.brides.com. You’ll get an itemized breakdown of expenses for your wedding. And that will help you prioritize what’s most important.
If you want the wedding to be more about dancing and energy, and not so much about sitting down and having a great meal, put more money toward the cocktail reception says Daniel Briones, president of the National Association of Catering Executives, a catering association. You don’t need a four-course meal he says. You can get rid of the appetizer or just have a salad.
Alcohol is another wallet-drainer. But you can keep costs under control by offering a limited bar with beer and wine says Christa Vagnozzi, senior editor of theWeddingchannel.com. In addition to beer and wine, you can also serve a signature cocktail she says.
And skip the champagne toast says Briones.
“Most of your guests will already have a glass of wine in front of them,” he says. If you have a wedding with 200 guests and you’re serving a $50 bottle of champagne, you would save $2,000 right off the bat.
Rent the showy cake
A wedding cake can also cause sticker shock. On average, a cake costs about $700 according to The Knot survey. But you can cut this price in half without your guests even knowing.
Rent-a-Cake in Atlanta will rent you a tiered Styrofoam cake with icing on the outside, so it looks like the real thing. It’ll cost you about $145 to rent the cake including set-up. There’s a secret compartment in the back of the cake where you can hide a slice of angel food cake so guests think you’re cutting into the real thing. Then you serve your guests a less expensive sheet cake that’s hidden in the kitchen.
Check out other online cake rentals like cake.rental.com. But if staying local is what you want to do, ask your baker to create a fake layer or two in your cake.
And while it may seem insignificant, flowers alone can eat up 8 percent of your budget according to The Knot. To stay within your budget, stick with flowers that are in season and make sure you tell your florist what you can spend. It’s not like you’re going into a store and picking something off a shelf, says Preli. You’re creating a relationship with a vendor.
That strategy worked for Michelle, who settled on Gerber Daisies for her wedding.
“When I went to the florist I said, ‘look we’re not mansion dwellers, we’re apartment dwellers,’” says Michelle. “The florist really worked with me and steered me to less expensive flowers that were still elegant.”
You may also consider getting your flowers from the wholesale market. Ask for recommendations from other brides on virtual message boards at www.brides.com or www.theweddingchannel.com. And do your homework. Check out the company with the Better Business Bureau and ask a lot of questions. You don’t want to be unhappy when these flowers show up at your door says Vagnozzi.
On sale or for rent
Most brides dream about that perfect wedding gown. In fact, one in five brides say finding the perfect dress is the top priority, according to a survey by Conde Nast Bridal Media.
And you can find bargains if you know where to look. Save money at sample sales. Most sales take place in April/May for fall and winter dresses and October/November for spring and summer dresses, according to The Knot. Even department stores have discounted wedding dresses. Michelle got her dress at a 70 percent off sale at Filene’s Basement.
“I had to commit to the dress early and it needed about $200 worth of work and $150 cleaning, but it was beautiful,” she says.
And make sure you look at Web sites like eBay, www.PreOwnedWeddingDresses.com or www.WoreItOnce.com for gently used wedding dresses. If you want a designer handbag or jewelry for your big day, consider renting them at www.bagborroworsteal.com.
Even getting the word out about your wedding can be expensive. Cut costs on your invitations by leaving out all the extras like engraving or decorative linings. Decrease the number of enclosures you have. You can ask guests to e-mail you their replies. Check out online invitation outlets or create your own invites. Your local arts and crafts store will likely have a selection to choose from.
And although it took Michelle an entire year of planning, negotiating and tailoring her wedding dream, she says it was worth it. Despite the fact the couple came in at their budget, Michelle realized that all her work was worth something even more valuable.
“It helped me mature as a woman to come from the idea I had as a girl and as a young woman…to grow that idea up and accept certain limitations and embrace what WAS possible,” she says.
The guests at her wedding said it was the best wedding they had ever been to. “They said it had a lot of us in it,” Michelle says.
“At the end of the day, the thing that matters the most is that ‘I do moment,’” says Preli. “That’s what your guests will remember. That’s what you can’t pay for.”
Planned Racism
A few months ago, a student newspaper made a minor flap by calling Planned Parenthood offices and gathering information supporting the thesis that the organization targets black women. I read a few pieces about journalistic ethics or something, but nothing really became of the story.
The ERLC has a transcript of one of the conversations. Read it. You will not believe it.
Roman Cataract Surgery
We most often think of the ancient world as a completely barbaric place - strictly speaking, it was of course - what with the freedom with which the Romans labeled everyone else, but that is beside the point here. People were not different people back then. They were the same types of people we have now, just in a different cultural and technological situation. It does not surprise me that the ancients had many “advanced” activities, constrained only by their relative technology.
Case in point, Roman doctors performed cataract surgery:
“Interestingly the Roman author Celsus described cataract extraction surgery using a specially pointed needle - and possible cataract needles (specilla) have been found in Britain as well as elsewhere in the Roman Empire.”
If you are one of those people who stay up at night stressing over what exactly the apostle Paul’s thorn in the side was, perhaps now you can rule out cataracts, since there was apparently a remedy for that. Just trying to be helpful…
The Only Prudes?
Peter Bronson of the Cincinnati Enquirer sheds some light on the ‘Bodies’ exhibit.
The Constitution and God’s Standards
A few night’s ago, at a Michigan campaign stop, Mike Huckabee said the following:
“I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it’s a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that’s what we need to do is amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards rather than trying to change God’s standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other and how we treat the family.”
Perhaps I am late to the party, or perhaps the MSM just hasn’t picked it up yet, but several liberal types on the internet seem to be making a big deal about this statement - recognizing in it a plea for a “theocracy.” This seems to be a ridiculous and un-thought-out assertion, betraying an ignorance of mainstream conservative evangelical thought.
It should come as no surprise that religious conservative and conservative voters are upset with gay “marriage” and abortion - or at least the judicial usurpation of these issues. It should further be recognized that one reason (a big reason) for some voter’s opposition to these practices is based on their interpretation of religious writings they receive as authoritative. It was just a matter of time before one of these people became a candidate and spoke the language of these voters.
Part of the democratic process is hearing the voices of the electorate and evaluating their claims. It is not a “theocracy” for conservative religious people to share their views on abortion any more than it is an imposition of theology for liberal religious speakers to preach against war or advocate an increase in welfare entitlements. Would Huckabee’s detractors deny him access to the public square to make his case before the populace? Such seems patently un-American.
You may not agree with Huckabee’s positions on gay “marriage” or abortion, but amending the Constitution with specific policy statements would make them constitutional laws, not religious laws. The candidate is not speaking of the establishment of a particular national church. The candidate is not advocating the alteration of the Constitution to privilege a certain faith. He is advocating public policy decisions to be considered by the American public. His own personal basis for recommending these changes may stem in part from religious motivations, but the policies and process themselves are entirely secular.
An amendment to the Constitution that privileges the dignity of human life would be a statement that a Constitutionally controlled people made the democratic decision to set a standard for how the country should operate. It would not create a theocracy any more than the 13th amendment, widely supported by religious abolitionists, created a theocracy.
The cries of “theocracy” and “theo-con” and etc. are nothing more than political spin attempts to discredit the policy positions with which the critics disagree. Where any fear actually exists, it is the result of paranoia. Of course, the true danger to a Constitutional way of life for our country is not from Huckabee’s statements or those who oppose them for political reasons, but from those who oppose his views specifically because they have some basis in religious thought. Rabid secularists would seek to squelch the protected speech of religious citizens, bar certain candidates of faith from public office, and silence the voice of certain of America’s citizens. This is anti-religious bigotry in its worst form and undermines the most cherished of American guarantees - a voice.
It is not immoral to be a moral person who cares about others and the welfare of our country. It is not un-American to participate in the great debate. It is both to promote falsehood and fear an effort to deny citizens their political and religious rights.
More Stem-Cell Reflection
Bush may not be closed-minded idiot after all
Here is another post - adult-derived -pluripotent-stem-cells consideration of the balanced approach President Bush took to the “stem-cell issue.” Written by Jay Lefkowitz, former Bush domestic-policy advisor responsible for primary White House research on the subject, the article offers a behind-the-scenes look at how the principle was reached and the decision was made.
We do not know enough yet to say whether, or to what degree, Bushs refusal to allow federal funding to create new embryonic stem-cell lines played a role in compelling scientists to find a different approach to the issue. We do know that, in the aftermath of last Novembers announcement, several leading scientists have suddenly testified in public to having harbored the very same moral doubts that led Bush to his 2001 decision. James Thomson, the foremost stem-cell researcher in the United States, put it plainly: If human embryonic stem-cell research does not make you at least a little bit uncomfortable, you have not thought about it enough.
This was not, to put it mildly, a view openly expressed by the scientific community in the years between Bushs decision and the discovery of the new method. But remarks like Thomsons, and the fact that a scientific advance unthinkable in 2001 has rendered one of the ugliest controversies of the decade all but moot, suggest that it is time to revisit Bushs decision to see what lessons can be drawn from it.
Other articles reviewing Bush’s decision are referenced here. Lefkowitz’s article gives some background information regarding the political status of stem-cell research prior to Bush’s decision that, if had been known and more widely reported, would have altered the knee-jerk-self-righteous opinion of many.
It is en vogue these days to hate President Bush and point out all of his perceived flaws and bad decisions. I do not claim to have a comprehensive grasp of all that he has done, but as more information about more decisions during his tenure come to light it is clear that in many ways for many issues Bush was the right man at the right time for the job.
Domus del Chirurgo
For the past 17 years, the Italian government has funded the excavation of a Roman doctor’s house - the Domus del Chirurgo (House of the Surgeon). An interesting read for a student of the Bible if you first consider that Luke (who wrote the Gospel) is widely considered to have been a physician during this time.
From the article:
An ancient doctor’s surgery unearthed by Italian archaeologists has cast new light on what a trip to the doctor would have been like in Roman times. Far from crude, the medical implements discovered show that doctors, their surgeries and the ailments they treated have changed surprisingly little in 1,800 years.
Sore joints were common, patients were often told to change their diets, and the good doctor of the seaside town of Rimini even performed house calls.
“This is the largest find of surgical instruments anywhere,” said Dr Ralph Jackson, the curator of the Romano-British collection at the British Museum and an expert in ancient medicine.
Are the tools found similar to the tools Luke carried with him while he traveled on missionary journeys with the apostle Paul? Did the physician follower of Jesus attempt some of these methods to help Paul with his famous unknown ailment? Fascinating.
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