Let this sink in...

"How should one chase a thousand, and two put ten thousand to flight, except their Rock had sold them, and the LORD had shut them up?" Deut 32:30

The Wiggles were awarded Australian Catholic University's (ACU) highest honour

I knew the CC would love these weirdos.

The Wiggles

 The Wiggles were awarded Australian Catholic University's (ACU) highest honour, Doctor of the University (honoris causa), at the University's Sydney Faculty of Education graduation ceremony on Tuesday 11 April 2006 at 7pm at Sydney Town Hall.

The honour was bestowed upon The Wiggles by the University in recognition of their outstanding contribution to early-years education and child development through the arts. "Red" Wiggle, Murray Cook, provided the occasional address at the ceremony.

Speaking about the Wiggles' achievements, ACU Vice-Chancellor, Professor Peter Sheehan AO said,

"The Wiggles have provided challenging and highly stimulating education and great enjoyment to our children in their early years. Drawing on their natural talents and energies, this group has used its knowledge of early childhood education, the value of the preciousness of individuals and their keen interest in music and art to bring joy, humanity and great happiness to the young children of Australia, the United States of America, Great Britain, China and New Zealand."

Disturbing fact (link)

Seymour Hersh unleashed

Update (2/13/23): Legendary investigative journalist Seymour Hersh claimed on Saturday that his latest bombshell report, which suggests the CIA was responsible for the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines in September, was not a hard story to find. It was obvious that there was more to the issue than was being reported by most media outlets, Hersh said. Link

 

Original Article (1/20/11):

Seymour Hersh unleashed 

(Seymour (Sy) Myron Hersh (born April 8, 1937) is a United States Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and author based in Washington, D.C. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine on military and security matters.)

Posted By Blake Hounshell Tuesday, January 18, 2011 - 1:34 AM Share

DOHA, Qatar—David Remnick, call your office.
In a speech billed as a discussion of the Bush and Obama eras, New Yorker journalist Seymour Hersh delivered a rambling, conspiracy-laden diatribe here Monday expressing his disappointment with President Barack Obama and his dissatisfaction with the direction of U.S. foreign policy.

"Just when we needed an angry black man," he began, his arm perched jauntily on the podium, "we didn't get one."

It quickly went downhill from there.

Hersh, whose exposés of gross abuses by members of the U.S. military in Vietnam and Iraq have earned him worldwide fame and high journalistic honors, said he was writing a book on what he called the "Cheney-Bush years" and saw little difference between that period and the Obama administration.

He said that he was keeping a "checklist" of aggressive U.S. policies that remained in place, including torture and "rendition" of terrorist suspects to allied countries, which he alleged was ongoing.

He also charged that U.S. foreign policy had been hijacked by a cabal of neoconservative "crusaders" in the former vice president's office and now in the special operations community.

"What I'm really talking about is how eight or nine neoconservative, radicals if you will, overthrew the American government. Took it over," he said of his forthcoming book. "It's not only that the neocons took it over but how easily they did it -- how Congress disappeared, how the press became part of it, how the public acquiesced."

Hersh then brought up the widespread looting that took place in Baghdad after the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. "In the Cheney shop, the attitude was, ‘What's this? What are they all worried about, the politicians and the press, they're all worried about some looting? ... Don't they get it? We're gonna change mosques into cathedrals. And when we get all the oil, nobody's gonna give a damn.'"

"That's the attitude," he continued. "We're gonna change mosques into cathedrals. That's an attitude that pervades, I'm here to say, a large percentage of the Joint Special Operations Command."

He then alleged that Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who headed JSOC before briefly becoming the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and his successor, Vice Adm. William McRaven, as well as many within JSOC, "are all members of, or at least supporters of, Knights of Malta."

Hersh may have been referring to the Sovereign Order of Malta, a Roman Catholic organization commited to "defence of the Faith and assistance to the poor and the suffering," according to its website.

"Many of them are members of Opus Dei," Hersh continued. "They do see what they're doing -- and this is not an atypical attitude among some military -- it's a crusade, literally. They see themselves as the protectors of the Christians. They're protecting them from the Muslims [as in] the 13th century. And this is their function."

"They have little insignias, these coins they pass among each other, which are crusader coins," he continued. "They have insignia that reflect the whole notion that this is a culture war. … Right now, there’s a tremendous, tremendous amount of anti-Muslim feeling in the military community.”"

Hersh relayed that he had recently spoken with "a man in the intelligence community... somebody in the joint special operations business" about the downfall of Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia. "He said, ‘Oh my God, he was such a good ally.'"

"Tunisia's going to change the game," Hersh added later. "It's going to scare the hell out of a lot of people."

Moving to Pakistan, where Hersh noted he had been friendly with Benazir Bhutto, the journalist told of a dinner meeting with Asif Ali Zardari, the late prime minister’s husband, in which Hersh said the Pakistani president was brutally disdainful of his own people.

Hersh described a trip he made to Swat, where the Pakistani military had just dislodged Taliban insurgents who had taken over the scenic valley, a traditional vacation area for the urban middle class. Hersh said he asked Zardari about the tent cities he saw along the road, where people were living in harsh, unsanitary conditions.

“Well, those people there in Swat, that’s what they deserve,” the Pakistani president replied, according to Hersh. Asked why, Hersh said Zardari responded, “Because they supported the Taliban.” (Note: Hersh's conversation is not recounted in his 2009 New Yorker article on Pakistan's nuclear weapons, presumably because it couldn't be verified.)

The veteran journalist also alleged that the CIA station chief in Islamabad, who was recently recalled after his name surfaced in Pakistani court documents and in the lively Pakistani press, had actually been fired for disputing the plans of Gen. David Petraeus, who took over the Afghan war last summer after General McChrystal was summarily dismissed.

"When Petraeus issued a very optimistic report about the war in December that he gave to the president," Hersh said, the station chief "just declared it was bankrupt... internally. He just said ‘This is completely wrongheaded. The policy's wrongheaded.' Off he goes. Out he goes."


"I've given up being disillusioned about the CIA," Hersh said. "They're trained to lie, period. They will lie to their president, they will lie certainly to the Congress, and they will lie to the American people. That's all there is to it."

Hersh was speaking on the invitation of Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, which operates a branch campus in Qatar.

The Unfortunate Story of Jean Calas

Jean Calas (1698 – March 10, 1762) was a merchant living in Toulouse, France, famous for having been the victim of a biased trial due to his being a Protestant. In France, he is a symbol of Christian religious intolerance, along with Jean-François de la Barre and Pierre-Paul Sirven.

Calas, along with his wife, was a Protestant. France was then a mostly Catholic country; Catholicism was the state religion. While the harsh oppression of Protestantism initiated by King Louis XIV had largely receded, Protestants were, at best, tolerated. Louis, one of the Calas' sons, converted to Catholicism in 1756. On October 13-October 14, 1761, another of the Calas' sons, Marc-Antoine, was found dead on the ground floor of the family's home. Rumors had it that Jean Calas had killed his son because he, too, intended to convert to Catholicism. The family, interrogated, first claimed that Marc-Antoine had been killed by a murderer. Then they declared that they had found Marc-Antoine dead, hanged; since suicide was then considered a heinous crime against oneself, and the dead bodies of suicides were defiled, they had arranged for their son's suicide to look like a murder.

On March 9, 1762, the parlement (appellate court) of Toulouse sentenced Jean Calas to death on the wheel. On March 10, at the age of 64, he died tortured on the wheel, while still very firmly claiming his innocence. Voltaire, contacted about the case, after initial suspicions that Calas was guilty of anti-Catholic fanaticism had subsided, began a campaign to get Calas' sentence overturned.

On March 9, 1765, Jean Calas was found not guilty.

• l'Affaire Calas (in French)
• Voltaire's Traité sur la Tolérance à l'occasion de la mort de Jean Calas (in French)
•  "The Calas Case". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913. 
•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). "Calas, Jean". Encyclopædia Britannica (Eleventh ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

The Vatican in the News 1/18/11

 Vatican Warned Bishops Not to Report Child Abuse
New York Times
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN A newly disclosed document reveals that Vatican officials instructed the bishops of Ireland in 1997 that they must not adopt a policy of ...

Miracle? Nun says she recovered after praying to Pope
NDTV.com
But in a statement Friday, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints said Vatican-appointed doctors had "scrupulously" studied the case and determined that ...

Rabbi and Pope discuss Jewish-Christian cooperation in Israel
Catholic News Agency
Vatican City, Jan 17, 2011 / 08:10 pm (CNA).- Pope Benedict met with prominent Israeli Rabbi Shlomo Riskin on Jan. 12, who updated the pontiff on the ...


 Pontiff Receives Lutheran Delegation From Finland
Catholic.net
Today in the Vatican, the Pope received members of a Catholic-Lutheran delegation from Finland who make an annual trip to Rome for the feast day of St. ...

Pope's blood to be built into altar Sydney Morning Herald The exact date of the opening is not yet known, but it should be shortly after John Paul's beatification at the Vatican on May 1. ...

The real assassination target in Tucson?

This info was taken from here. I always recommend everyone verify all things. Let this sort of be a disclaimer. Several times I have found info connected to Alex Jones to be wrong. Even in matters such as this. I believe he does this on purpose to incite revolution and extremist behavior for the goal of harming the reputations of truth-seekers. The Alex Jones Operation (Project Alex Jones) has many purposes. One purpose is to be a "straw man sock puppet" meant to discredit the whole grass roots, alternative media, constitutionalists, ect ect movements ... -T.R.

Meet Judge John Roll

"Widely respected." "A wise jurist." The US news media heaped on the praise, but was purposefully vague about who this extraordinary judge was and what he actually did. The early and oft-repeated media claim "the judge was just in the wrong place at the wrong time" doesn't ring true for several reasons, the most important being how the heck would they know and know so quickly? Equally as suspicious, why did they feel the need to repeat this statement over and over again from the very beginning of the reports? Who inserted this into the news stream? Judge Roll was an opponent of the Federal government overreaching its authority. Specifically: 1. He ruled against federal imposition on states rights in gun law matters, 2. He ruled against elements of the Patriot Act (the part where federal "law enforcement agents" can seize your bank account without cause), and 3. He ruled against the newly announced FEMA Governor system in which the federal government plans to take the power of elected state Governors and put in in the hands of federally-appointed "regional" governors in the case of an "emergency." It's a rare judge these days that stands up to this BS or shows any interest in the Constitution at all. And he ended up dead in the parking lot of a Safeway Supermarket at the hands of a "lone nut" who local law enforcement allowed to run wild publicly making violent threats against employers and school administrators.

Link to page with video

EU and Vatican criticised

The People's Assembly launched a scathing attack against the European Parliament accusing it of disseminating false reports about the "repression of Christians" in Egypt, reports Gamal Essam El-Din

 

Egyptian MPs, belonging to the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) and opposition, opened fire on the Brussels-based European Parliament, accusing it of interfering in Egypt's internal affairs. Speaker of the People's Assembly Fathi Sorour told MPs in a session on Monday morning that he condemned the way in which the European Parliament had "tried to exploit the attack which hit the Two Saints Church on the New Year's Eve in order to imply that there is a systematic policy of repression against Coptic Christians in Egypt". Sorour said that in a meeting with a delegation from the Bundestag (German parliament) yesterday, he had stressed that "the terrorist attack against the Alexandrian church targeted Muslims and Christians alike and the European Parliament's statements about repression of Christians in Egypt are entirely unfounded".

Supporting Sorour, senior NDP MPs accused the European Parliament of propagating lies about Egypt. Abdel-Ahad Gamaleddin, NDP spokesman in the People's Assembly, insisted that "the European Parliament's statement claiming that Coptic Christians face persecution shows how most European institutions are completely ignorant of the situation in Egypt."

Chairman of the assembly's National Security and Defence Committee Amin Radi urged the European Parliament to exercise restraint before publishing false statements about religious conditions in Egypt.

"The European Parliament should fully understand that the bomb attack against the church was aimed at sowing discord between Christians and Muslims in Egypt," Radi said.

The Ghad Party's Ragab Hilal Hemeida accused the European Parliament of offering money to its clients in Egypt to spread lies and instill a kind of "creative chaos in the country".

MPs also attacked Pope Benedict XVI for issuing a statement that reflected "the spirit of the Crusades". "Please, Pope of the Vatican," pleaded independent Coptic MP Gamal Assad Abdel-Malak, "stop recalling the spirit of the Crusades. Copts in Egypt do not face repression and are not in need of the protection of the Christian West." 

"Since Napoleon Bonaparte's French Expedition and until the Zionist colonialist campaigns of today the West has been trying to exploit what it calls the Coptic issue and other religious minorities to interfere with the internal affairs of Egypt. Yes, there are some discriminatory policies against the Copts but these are nowhere near a systematic policy of persecution."

Abdel-Malak urged the government "not to dig its head into the sand like an ostrich and assume everything is OK with Egypt's Copts". He asked the ruling NDP to enter into "open discussion" of Coptic grievances "so as to close the door to foreign meddling".

Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, was also singled out by MPs for attack. Saad Al-Gammal, chairman of the assembly's Arab Affairs Committee, charged that both "the Mossad and the extremist Islamist organisation Al-Qaeda are seeking to inflame sectarian strife in countries like Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen."

"Mossad now serves the interests of Al-Qaeda and vice-versa. Neither will be able to break the national unity of Egypt."

Raafat Seif, spokesman of the leftist Tagammu Party, refused to join the anti-European Parliament tirade, saving his criticism for the proliferation of policies that allowed the growth of the kind of intolerance that culminated in the Alexandria bombing.

"Such policies include the growth of extremist education in private and government schools, the use of television and print media and mosques to spread hate against others, including Copts, describing them as infidels," said Seif.

NDP MPs tried to stop Seif from continuing until Sorour intervened. He went on to denounce "the extremist ideology of Wahabi Islam which had imposed itself on Egypt at the expense of the moderate and centrist ideology of Al-Azhar, which calls for tolerance, freedom of religion and inter-faith dialogue".

In response, Sorour urged MPs not to link Coptic grievances with the Alexandria bomb attack. "In so doing," he argued, "MPs are repeating foreign allegations that the bomb attack is somehow linked to Coptic grievances and the repression of Christians in Egypt."

Minister of State for Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Moufid Shehab reiterated the argument that the bombing was an attempt to sow divisions among Egyptians. He warned MPs against confusing issues "by connecting the crime to Coptic grievances".

NDP MPs also criticised coverage of the attack on television channels. "Coverage of the bombing was at odds with the national interest," said Abdel-Ahad. "Channels which refuse to toe the national line should be closed."

Zakaria Azmi, chief of the presidential staff and a heavyweight NDP MP, accused daily newspapers of being so desperate to obtain a scoop that they had published conflicting reports about the results of the investigation into the Alexandria attack.

"Such irresponsibility could force citizens to lose confidence in the investigating authorities," he said. Newspapers should remember that the penal code criminalises all forms of intervention in ongoing investigations," said Azmi.
 

Family of late Polish president accuses Moscow of crash plot

The family of late Polish president Lech Kaczynski who died with 95 others in an April 2010 air crash in western Russia said on Monday that Moscow may have plotted to assassinate him.

6:01PM GMT 17 Jan 2011

 

"Today the hypothesis of an assassination plot against the Polish president is more plausible than ever," Marcin Dubieniecki, the husband and lawyer of the late Kaczynski's only child, daughter Marta, told Polish media on Monday.

"There are many things indicating that (the Russians would have wanted) to assassinate Lech Kaczynski," Ms Dubieniecki told Poland's commercial TVN24 news channel.

Kaczynski was known for his deep suspicion of Poland's Soviet-era master Moscow and for holding a staunch policy line against Russian moves in the region.

According to Ms Dubieniecki, Moscow may have been motivated by "the possible re-election of president Lech Kaczynski, revenge for (his backing) Georgia and by Russian interests in relations between Moscow and the European Union."

In its final report issued last Wednesday in Moscow, Russian investigators blamed the catastrophe on the incompetence of the plane's Polish pilots and pressure from senior officials on the flight to land despite dangerous weather warnings.

Ms Dubieniecki accused Russian investigators of ignoring an attempt by Polish pilots to regain altitude and abort the landing 22 seconds prior to the crash.

The attempt "failed because the crew was misinformed about the plane's altitude and about the position of the landing course and path," Ms Dubieniecki charged.

The Russian crash report stirred controversy in Poland, with liberal Prime Minister Donald Tusk saying Poland would present its own version after he termed the Russian findings "incomplete".

Meanwhile Kaczynski's surviving twin and conservative opposition leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski said Moscow's report "made a mockery of Poland."

The report clears local air traffic controllers and the technical condition of the regional airport in Smolensk of having been a factor in the crash.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his Polish counterpart Bronislaw Komorowski pledged on Friday to continue dialogue.

Related Articles

• Poland's Jaroslaw Kaczynski doubts body in tomb is presidential twin

  20 Dec 2010

• Pilot error blamed in Polish plane crash report

  17 Jan 2011

• Poland rejects Russian report on plane crash

  17 Jan 2011

• Polish plane crash victims' bodies may be exhumed

  17 Jan 2011

• Two dead after all engines fail on Russian plane

  17 Jan 2011

• Lives Remembered

  17 Jan 2011

New Provincial Named for California Province of the Society of Jesus

Los Gatos, CA—Fr. Michael F. Weiler, S.J., has been appointed by Fr. General Adolfo Nicolás, S.J, as the next provincial of the California Province of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits). Fr. Weiler succeeds Fr. John McGarry, S.J., who has served as provincial of the California Province since 2005. Fr. Weiler will take office on the Feast of St. Ignatius Loyola, July 31, 2011.

Fr. Weiler currently serves as Director of Novices and Superior of Ignatius House Novitiate, a position he has held since 2005.

Fr. Weiler is a graduate of Bellarmine College Preparatory, Loyola Marymount University, Gonzaga University, Jesuit School of Theology, and California School of Professional Psychology. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1975, was ordained in 1988 and received his final vows in 2005. Following ordination, Fr. Weiler served as an associate pastor at Dolores Mission in Los Angeles and then as an instructor in counseling psychology and a psychologist at Santa Clara University.

For more information about the California Province of the Society of Jesus, see www.jesuitscalifornia.org, or contact the Advancement Office at advancement@calprov.org.

Years of harassment by Feds may have lead to threats

Vincent McCrudden - CEO  of Alnbri Management, LLC has been arrested for alledgedly making threats against federal regulators.

The article in the Long Island Press reads,

"FBI agents arrested Vincent McCrudden, 49, of Long Beach, Thursday at Newark Liberty International Airport as he returned from Singapore. Federal prosecutors believe McCrudden had been there for the past several months.

He is accused of threatening 47 employees of the U.S. Commodities Futures Trading Commission and other agencies. Many of the messages included profanity laced tirades against the regulators, according to a complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Central Islip.

McCrudden was ordered held without bail at an initial court appearance Friday. A preliminary hearing was scheduled for Jan. 27.

“Although bad tempered and at times ill-mannered, he is a good and decent man. He does not pose a true threat to anyone,” said defense lawyer Bruce Barket. “Vulgar language, bad use of metaphors and very poor timing are not crimes.”

Prosecutors said that in addition to death threats posted on his website, McCrudden posted a $100,000 reward seeking personal information about several government officials.

“In this day and age, there is no such thing as an idle threat,” U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch said in a statement. “Those who threaten injury or worse to the lives of others will be promptly investigated and vigorously prosecuted.”

The threats against the regulators followed a a CFTC civil enforcement lawsuit filed against McCrudden in December, prosecutors said. The complaint alleged McCrudden has been the subject of various enforcement or disciplinary proceedings over several years.

But even before the CFTC action, he allegedly sent an email to an employee of the National Futures Association, stating: “It wasn’t ever a question of if I was going to kill you, it was just a question of when. And now, that question has been answered. You are going to die a painful death.”

His website also allegedly included an “execution list” with the names of 47 current and former federal regulators, prosecutors said, including the chairperson of the Securities and Exchange Commission.


But Mr. Vincent McCrudden  States on his web site:

     Mr. McCrudden worked on Wall Street for over 20 years. He started his career on the floors of the New York Commodity Exchange executing orders for some of the largest institutions in the world including hedge funds and Commercial & Investment Banks. He then ran Global Desks in such areas as Foreign Exchange, Credit Derivatives & Equity Derivatives. He taught derivatives courses at the New York Institute of Finance.

     Mr. McCrudden is a former soccer player at the University of Rhode Island, and then played professionally for the Tampa Bay Rowdies and Minnesota Strikers of the NASL. He also was an amateur boxer and has raised money over the years for the NYPD for slained [sic] and disabled officers.  He has two beautiful children.

     Mr. McCrudden has spent the past 13 years and counting combating a colluded Government attempt to discredit and harrass Mr. McCrudden through repeated bogus procedures. Mr. McCrudden has sought relief by suing multiple agencies and officials for $1 Billion. But this has not stopped certain higher ranking officials because they know that Judges are Government employees too. In order to stop the libel, slander and harrassment at the hands of these entities, and with no available forum in the US justice system, Mr. McCrudden has started a process to enact payback for years of Government abuse. As a twice survivor of the WTC bombings, Mr. McCrudden knows all too well what the Government can do in the "name of public interest". Mr. McCrudden believes the 23 friends he lost on 9-11-2001 would have had their full support. Wake up my fellow citizens and middle class and go look into the mirror, because you my friends are the face of the new Al Qaeda! Civil disobedience can be a start for justice. Its us (middle class) against them (Government officials and the Bourgeosie).  Start acting now before its too late!

     Government employees should be individually accountable and not be able to hide behind the veils of their entities. If they are sued for bad behaviour, they should have to use their own resources and money like any other citizen.

So what's the story? Government corruption, intimidation and harassment? Or is this man doing what people sometimes do and try and hide from their crimes by making accusations against the government? By what I've read he seems very angry and appears to believe he's truly being harassed. If convicted he faces up to five years in prison for each of the two counts.

Additional Links:

Here's The "Execution List" Posted By The Crazed Money Manager Who Threatened To Kill 47 SEC, CFTC And FINRA Members

and

Vincent McCrudden

Spanish king Juan Carlos to visit Russia in February



King Juan Carlos and President Dmitry Medvedev

 King Juan Carlos of Spain is expected to visit Russia on February 25, Spanish Foreign Minister Trinidad Jimenez said on Monday.

The king will visit St. Petersburg, accompanied by the country's foreign minister and industry minister, Jimenez said at a meeting with Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov.

Juan Carlos is expected to meet with top executives of leading Russian companies, she added.

Zhukov recalled that 2011 is the Year of Spain in Russia and the Year of Russia in Spain.

"It is very nice that the Year of Russia in Spain and the Year of Spain in Russia is starting against the backdrop of very good ties between our countries, both on the political and economic level," he said.

MOSCOW, January 17 (RIA Novosti)

Stephen Hawking With Pope Benedict at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences

Pope Benedict "blesses" Stephen Hawking at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the Vatican, 2008

Video:

Pope picks Protestant to head Vatican's sciences academy

By The Associated Press (CP) – 6 hours ago

VATICAN CITY — The pope has picked a Protestant to head the Vatican's sciences academy.

Benedict XVI chose Werner Arber, a Swiss molecular biologist who shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1978, as president of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. A Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Ciro Benedettini, said Sunday it is the first time a non-Catholic heads the academy in its four centuries of history.

The academy help pontiffs understand scientific advances in fields ranging from genetics to nuclear physics. Arber became a member in 1981. Other non-Catholics who have been prominent academy members, but not president, include Rita Levi Montalcini, an Italian Jew and 1986 Nobel winner for medicine.

From wiki: "He is member of the World Knowledge Dialogue Scientific Board and of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences since 1981. Pope Benedict XVI appointed him as President of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on January 2011, making him the first Protestant to hold the position.^[2]"

Jesuits take D.C.

Don't forget, this isn't just talking about Roman Catholics. This is just individuals who graduated from a Jesuit University or College. Roman Catholics make up a much bigger percentage than this. This page is a mirror of this blog (it's been scrubbed from the internet)


Fifty-three members of the 112th Congress are alumni of the nation's twenty-eight Jesuit colleges and universities.  Thirty-five attained graduate or professional degrees from Jesuit universities. Twelve serve in the Senate and forty-one in the House.

Here are the Senators:

• John Barrasso, (R-WY) Appointed 2007, Elected 2008, B.A. Georgetown University (1974) and M.D. Georgetown University (1978)
• Scott Brown, (R-MA) Elected 2010, J.D. Boston College (1984)
• Robert P. Casey, Jr., (D-PA) Elected 2006, B.A. College of the Holy Cross (1982)
• Richard J. Durbin, (D-IL) Elected 1996, B.S.F.S. Georgetown University (1966) and J.D. Georgetown University (1969)
• Michael (Mike) Johanns, (R-NB) Elected 2008, J.D. Creighton University (1974)
• John F. Kerry, (D-MA) Elected 1984, J.D. Boston College (1976)
• Patrick J. Leahy, (D-VT) Elected 1974, J.D. Georgetown University (1964)
• Mark Steven Kirk, (R-IL) Elected 2010, J.D. Georgetown University (1992)
• Robert Menendez, (D-NJ) Appointed & Elected 2006, B.A. Saint Peter's College (1976)
• Barbara A. Mikulski, (D-MD) Elected 1986, B.A. Loyola University Maryland (1958)
• Lisa Murkowski, (R-AK) Appointed 2002, Elected 2004, B..A. Georgetown University (1980)
• Jim Webb, (D-VA) Elected 2006, J.D. Georgetown University (1975) 

Jesuit alumni also serve as House leaders.  Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) graduated from Xavier University and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) graduated from Georgetown.  You can see the rest of the house alumni by following the link.

Georgetown University leads the way with eighteen alumni, followed by Boston College (7), and the College of the Holy Cross (4).  Four schools (Creighton University, Fordham University, Marquette University, and the University of Detroit Mercy) each have 3.

Not bad. Unfortunately, neither my alma mater not current employer make the list.

At least another thirty alumni serve in the Obama administration including

• Department of Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates (Georgetown University, 1974, PhD)
• Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet A. Napolitano (Santa Clara University, 1979, BA)
• Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director Leon E. Panetta (Santa Clara University, 1960, BA)
• White House Chief of Staff William Daley (Loyola University Chicago, 1970, BA)

A few questions come to mind.

First, how does the percentage of Jesuit alumni serving in Congress today compare to previous sessions?  Is ten percent high? low?

Second, do individuals interested in public service choose to attend Jesuit colleges and universities or does the Ignatian experience cause them to pursue a life of public service?  Maybe we're doing something right.

Finally, how important is the Jesuit alumni network (current and former congressmen) in getting elected?  Are members of congress, in any way, more likely to work with each other because of their shared college experiences?  

You can see a global list on Wikipedia that includes Externado San Jose and UCA alumnus Mauricio Funes.

ROTARY, FREEMASONRY AND THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH

ROTARY, FREEMASONRY AND THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH Mirror of This Web Page

This badge was found by our historian colleague, Dr.  Wolfgang Ziegler and triggered off a search for its origin which has not yet been resolved.   The central part of what is otherwise a normal Rotary lapel badge, seems to show the symbols of Freemasonry, the set square and compasses, while the letter 'G' in the centre is also an indication of the Scottish Rite of Masonry. We know that many of the early Rotarians were Masons and  that, according to C.R. Hewitt in 'Towards My Neighbour', some Rotary clubs recruited exclusively from Freemasons until the practice was banned in the 1920s.  To date, no precise details of these links have been found in the archives of either body.

The relationship was a matter of some discussion and in February 1923, an article in 'The Rotary Wheel'  sought to allay fears among Rotarians who might think that their membership of the one could cause problems in the other.

However, many people who did not know much about these organisations, thought that Rotary was a form of Masonry.  This eventually led to a much more serious problem when the Catholic Church, which had long been an antagonist of Masonry, classed Rotary as a similar organisation.     Also see the Ziegler Collection G.K. Chesterton who was often a vocal critic of Rotary, was a Catholic convert. and his adherence to the sectarian line may have coloured his views.

The problems seem to have started in Spain about 1928 when  the Bishops of  Almeria, Leon,  Orense, Palencia and Tuy  laid charges that  Rotary is  "nothing else but a new satanic  organisation with the same background and teachings of masonry" and that "according to documents and reliable sources, Rotary is a suspected organisation, and should be considered as execrable and perverse". The Church also criticised and condemned Rotary for showing  a concept of life and of service without reference to church teaching.  Indeed, it seems that  they believed it a secret society with quasi-religious overtones as many in the Church thought was the case with Freemasonry.  For whatever reason, the Vatican took up the reins and  in 1929 issued a decree that "it is not expedient" for Catholic priests to participate in Rotary either as members or guests. This decree and its implications were worrying to the many Catholics in Rotary not the least the then President Tom Sutton who was himself a Catholic, and former Chancellor Germany Wilhelm Cuno, a member in Hamburg.

Critical and at times disparaging articles regularly appeared in Catholic newspapers, especially in the  'Civilta Cattolica' in Italy, and Tom Sutton went off to Rome to try to convince the Papal authorities that Rotary was not Masonic, and that it was a movement which was not in conflict with any Catholic teaching.

Sutton's attempts to convince the Secretary of State in the Vatican, Cardinal Gaspari, were fruitless and the anti-Rotary articles continued to be published.  An even more virulent article later appeared in Paris in 'La France Catholique' making allegations about both Paul Harris and the links between Rotary and Freemasonry, which were later reprinted in the Baltic paper 'Rytas'.

The factual errors could be, and promptly were shown to be false, and by 1933  there was a mood swing in the Vatican, perhaps partly occasioned by the number of prominent and influential Catholics throughout the world who were joining Rotary.  Priests were now allowed to use their discretion about attending or even joining Rotary.   Nevertheless, one of the results of the Church's attitude was the slow development of Rotary in some predominantly Catholic countries such as Ireland.  

This uneasy peace continued until 1951 when another Vatican decree warned priests that they should not join Rotary and that "the faithful should be aware of seditious and suspected organisations".  

By then, however, the world had changed and the decree caused an immediate angry response, among others from the then Catholic President of RI, Arthur Laqueux, and from the Rotarian Catholic Bishop of Fort Wayne, Indiana, who publicly declared  the decree "quite incomprehensible".

Fairly soon, the Vatican began to retract. The official newspaper 'Osservatore Romano' wrote "In some nations, because of a prevalent Masonic influx, the action of Rotary Clubs has conflicted with the activity and the needs of the Church.  It must be said, however, that such has not been the case in other nations where the attitude of Rotary has shown itself in practice tolerant and benevolent towards religious interests."

By the end of the decade, the Catholic Truth Society was able to declare that "Rotary is neither secret nor seditious".  It was nevertheless still regarded as a "society banned under pain of sin only"  and not of "sin and excommunication".  Gradually there was a thaw in relations between the Church and Rotary. In 1970 Pope Pius VI addressed Rotarians in Italy, and in 1979 Pope John Paul II spoke to the International Convention in Rome, praising some of Rotary's humanitarian programmes at a  special audience in the Vatican.  Later he accepted a Paul Harris Fellowship and a World Understanding and Peace Award from Rotary, while Catholic priests throughout the world were taking positions of authority, even serving as District Governors.

As Alvarez points out, it was not only Rotary that was condemned during the 1930s and 1940s.  The Lions Clubs and even the YMCA incurred the wrath of the Vatican. In fact, the condemnation of the Y.M.C.A. was even earlier in 1920 when it was described as "White Masonry", on the grounds that "such organisation, while showing special concern for the youth, corrupted their faith, teaching them a conception of life dispensing with the Church and all religious teachings. The Y.M.C.A. is contributing to the decay of the youth's faith, by affirming that its purpose  is to show them a conception of life without churches or religious confession".

Basil Lewis    Based on  Nicholl's 'The Golden Wheel',  Juan Alvarez's excellent analysis of 'Masonry in Latin America',  RIBI's 'The Rotary Wheel' and other published works. Also see, Rotarian Lodge #4195 A letter on this subject from Paul Harris (left) The following was provided by RGHF historian Calum Thomson:  18 May 2006 Paul Harris said the following: "fraternity without rituals, passwords and secrets". Source - Jeffrey Charles: 'Service Clubs in American Society' chapter 1 entitled "From Fraternity to Service".

The quote is derived from Paul Harris' promotional brochures which were distributed to the early (potential) members of ROTARY/One.

Charles concludes his paragraph by stating "Harris' organization promised an informality and exclusivity that fraternalism could not match."

You can perform your own search at http://www.historysearch.org/

Further to the piece about Masons and Rotary

Prince Conti, District Governor of D46 (Italy) in 1928 wrote: "Lately a few Catholic papers have shown doubts as to the origin and the work of our Association; and worse than that, they have tried to trace relations between Rotary and Masonry. These doubts of the Catholic press are not in the least just, and many Catholic priests belong to Rotary. We are sorry that such doubts exist, but we are not troubled, because we know perfectly well that no tie exists between the two Associations, and that in all our manifestations there is not one single thing that is not compatible with our consciences as Catholics and Italians and Fascists.

As the General President, Harry Rogers declared at the International Convention at Ostend, no tie has ever existed, exists, or will ever exist between the two associations. As President of Italian Rotary I declare that I would not remain in this position one hour if I had any doubts on this subject.


In this extract from an article in 'Rotary Wheel' in December 1928, Prince Conti hints at the problems Rotary was encountering in Italy as it was in Spain and Ireland.


From RGHF senior historian Basil Lewis, UK, 15 July 2008

Pietro Brunoldi (with help from Wolfgang Ziegler) writes on 22 July 2008:

Prince Piero Ginori Conti was NOT a President of the Rotary in Italy, but simply  District Governor in 1928-29 (District 46), representing the district newborn in the year 1925. So, probably there was a misunderstanding (or bad translation) when he wrote  District Governor..... probably by someone who didn't know the meaning of DG and  interpreted it as President.

Tony Alamo grovels to three Presidents in new public display of duplicity and hypocrisy



Picture from Tony Alamo's web site

 Tony Alamo is squirming like a worm caught in the hot sun and has published on his web site three letters to the current and two former Presidents of the United States.

Although in the past 30 years he has blamed all Presidents and Government agencies for being papal puppets, accusing Bill Clinton of being a crypto Catholic and blaming Bush for 9/11 and a papal inquisition in Iraq Alamo is now stating that they are doing a work of God.

He says of Bill Clinton, "Clinton, my friend, I know how much time you dedicate to our country. I know you made a lot of sacrifices. God will always bless you for what you did for our country." He continues, "Never before did our people enjoy happiness and economic prosperity as they did while you were our president. You made a lot of progress on the home front. You were faced with tough issues on the international front, such as the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. As a believer in Jesus Christ, I truly believe you, as a mediator in these negotiations, did more than any other person in this conflict. Things did not work well in the pursuit of peace, despite your best efforts to mediate a solution, and the breakdown of Camp David led to the bloodshed in the Holy Land, the land of Christ."

This is easy for Tony Alamo to do isn't it? Now that he's in the federal pen with a 175 year sentence. Who cares how much heat and suspicion and anger he has brought on his followers by his insistent flooding of every major city in this country with his "gospel" tracts which blamed the government for every major news event from the JFK assassinations to 9/11. And saying that all government agencies were simply extensions of the Pope in Rome.

http://www.alamoministries.com/content/english/Gospel_literature/another_pearl_harbor.html

Tony Alamo 'Enforcer' Found Dead

Tony Alamo 'Enforcer' Found Dead

KSPR - Alicia Agent - ‎1 hour ago‎

A man connected to convicted child molester and evangelist Tony Alamo has been found dead after Fort Smith police had been searching for him for two years. ...

Wanted Man Affiliated With Tony Alamo Ministries Found Dead

KHBS-KHOG Northwest Arkansas - ‎1 hour ago‎

Fort Smith Police say FBI notified them that John Erwin Kolbeck was found dead in Kentucky. More FORT SMITH, Ark. -- Fort Smith police said the Federal ...

Jesuit display of Leadership

A print of Jim Sinegal, president and CEO of Costco, is carried into the Jesuit's Seattle University Alumni and Admissions building to be installed in the space’s Mission in Action gallery. The gallery, open to the public, features images shot by staff photographer Chris Joseph Taylor that showcase and celebrate the accomplishments of students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends of the university who make a difference on campus, in the community and beyond. Check out the images in the A&A Building, on the corner of 12th and Marion.

The Jesuit School of Law's annual Red Mass

click here to see larger photo

The School of Law’s annual Red Mass honored the contributions of the legal community, and a special ceremony afterward honored the memory of the late Norm Maleng, longtime King County Prosecutor. Professor from Practice John McKay, Mike McKay, Maleng’s son, Mark, and widow, Judy Maleng, Dean Annette Clark and President Stephen Sundborg, S.J., gather in front of a painting of St. Thomas More, patron of statesman, politicians, judges and lawyers. The painting was a gift from the firm McKay Chadwell PLLC.

Learn more about Red Mass and view photos from the event.

Here is my extensive info in regards to who Thomas More was and what the Red Mass is really all about!

And here is an additional page I put together on the subject.