Western Powers Obama John McCain and the People of Ukraine

It Is the People of Ukraine NOT the Country but the People
This blog post by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com

Today I point to an article in the Moscow Times: If U.S. Arms Ukraine, Russia Could Arm Iran.

The chilling truth is that the people of Ukraine--not the country, the people--are not important enough to the powers of the west except as a tool for its own purpose. 

No arms because of oil. No arms because of the Iran negotiations that the O wants so desperately to complete. No arms because it might anger Putin. Sad to say as throughout history the people of Ukraine--not the country, but the people--are inhuman bargaining chips in this sick game of politics. John McCain speaks the truth and is put down. 

What makes this possible? A lack of humanity, compassion, an understanding of the value of human beings.  People matter.  I believe that there is a way to achieve goals without making humanity expendable.  The people in power who can act evidently do not or are not willing to work hard enough to figure it out.

This makes me literally sick.

St. Vincent: Love Thy Neighbor

This editorial remark by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com.

WRONG: This movie is supposed to be funny, and because it is supposed to be funny it demonstrates how low the morality to which many in Hollywood have sunk. I do not understand a parent who would allow a child to act in a movie with this type of subject matter. An adult taking a 12 year old boy to a strip club, dive bar and other places in not funny. It is child abuse.

I have not watched this movie and have no plans to do so.  Based upon the "funny" promotional description, decision was easily made.

13 Timely Inspirational Christian Quotes Louis Evely

Our Prayer by Louis Evely
New York: Herder and Herder, 1970

13 Timely Christian Quotes from the book Our Prayer by Louis Evely

 New York: Herder and Herder, 1970

1.  What actually happens is that God proposes and man disposes. God is pure proposal, calling, grace: Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door,  I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me(Rev. 3:20).

2.  Prayer is listening to God’s prayer to us.

3.  God loves us equally, as much as we allow ourselves to be loved, as far as we open ourselves to his love. He beckons everyone, but forces no one. (p.10)

4.  God wants to enter into the most lively and affectionate relationship possible with each one of us; he is limited only by our refusal. (p. 11)

5.  You do not even have to look for God.  If you do, you will never find him, because he is never anywhere other than where you are. (p. 11)

6.  Idolatry is not a specialty of primitive civilizations—it is a modern industry: we are idol factories.  If one could extract all our false ideas about God from our brains and collect them together, one would have the finest ethnographic museum in the world, a fantastic collection of totems, taboos and demons. (p. 37)

7.  God made man in his image and likeness and now we have gone and done the same to him!  (p. 37)

8.  A Christian is someone who witnesses to the fact that God has spoken to him. (p. 62)

9.  God is not omnipotent in the way we think—that is, in the way we should like to become omnipotent.  He is omnipotence of love, not of force. (p. 91)

10.  By making man free God deliberately limited himself. (p. 94)

11.  You cannot understand the world if you seek to find the reflection of God’s will in it; but it all becomes clear if you see the consequences of man’s will in it. (p. 95)

12.  We believe that God intervenes without cease, but in keeping with his nature as revealed in Jesus Christ, respecting the laws he has established and the liberty with which he has endowed us.  (p. 104)

13.  We live in an order of grace, which is of freedom, not subjection.  God constantly shows himself, but by signs of love, not acts of power. (p. 104)

This blog post created by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com.

12 Inspirational Christian Quotes John H McGoey SFM

The Sins of the Just
Fr. John H. McGoey, S.F.M., author
Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Company, 1963

12 Inspiring Christian Quotes from The Sins of the Just
John H. McGoey, S.F.M.*, author
Milwaukee WI: Bruce Publishing Company, 1963

Imprimi potest.  Nihil obstat.  Imprimatur.**

The Sins of the Just was written for Roman Catholic women both considering the religious life and those living within a religious order as nun.  Covering many aspects of everyday life within the religious community there is also good practical application for Christian readers living in the world.

In one sense, though on a much broader scale, all Christians are separated from the world spiritually, being as Christ taught, in the world but not of the world its many challenges of not succumbing to the temptation of joining in worldly ways.  

Sins of the Just was published just over 60 years past, yet the truths contained are still relevant and worthy of thought.  Used copies and print-on-demand of the book are available online through many book sites, as well as in libraries.  

Quotes by Fr. John H. McGoey, S.F.M.
Inspiring quotes for thought and inspiration

1 Mastering self is a hard process.  Spiritual exercises do not develop the soul as physical exercises do the body. Holiness sought begets pride oftener than union with god.  Time in religion cannot be equated with spirituality nor does it make sanctity inevitable.

2  Living for God is much more than avoiding blasphemy and other serious offenses against Him.  It is giving one’s life to God in very deed. 

3  Legal spirituality creates the theology of minimums.  The fulfillment of the least required amount, doing the bare necessities, establishing the lowest average for entering the Kingdom of Heaven, seeking to have one’s cake and eat it too—these are the factors in the theology of minimums. 

4  Many of the most effective fighters of modern war re not in uniform; they are heroes whose only insignia is bravery and their willingness to be forgotten in the victory they hope for. 

5  Tradition is sacred but it is not infallible.  If it were, Christopher Columbus would have died sitting on a dock in Genoa staring out into what was then considered space. 

6  Curiosity was given man by God so that he would seek knowledge through which he would learn more about even God himself. 

7  Love for truth demands great courage, for the truth reveals many unpleasant facts which will be faced only by the brave. 

8  Fearlessness comes from practice.  It comes from having gone into the valley of death and having come out alive; from having died to self and learned to live to God.  

9  Courage is only the refusal to be victimized by the emotion of fear or deprived of union with God by anticipation of its demands.

10  Tyranny is marked by intolerance of criticism.  Where there is freedom there is criticism as surely as where there is sun there is warmth.

11  There is only one sane reason for condemning criticism: the poor judgment of the critic.  But even criticism must be heard before it can be condemned.

12  The emotions are very useful.  They act like amber traffic lights.  These lights are not meant as a threat but as a safeguard to life, making a certain amount of time available for the though and action required to me the situation they reveal. 

*S.F.M., or Scarboro Foreign Mission Society: Scarboro Missions is a Society of Canadian Catholics, priests and laity, motivated by the Spirit, who dedicate themselves to the person, teaching and mission of Jesus Christ as expressed in his words, I have come that they may have life and have it to the full (John 10:10).  LINK to Scarboro Foreign Mission Society website.

**Imprimi potest, Latin for it can be printed, is a declaration by a major superior of a Roman Catholic religious institute that writings on questions of religion or morals by a member of the institute may be printed.  Superiors make such declarations only after censors charged with examining the writings have granted the nihil obstat, a declaration of no objection. Final approval can then be given through the imprimatur, let it be printed, of the author's bishop or of the bishop of the place of publication. (source: Wikipedia.org).