That.  Child.  Is.  Driving.  Me.  Crazy.

Fortunately, this forced a variation of fish tacos that turned out better than my last try, so here it is:

Ingredients:

• leftover fried fish (I had plaice, which is related to flounder.  Any mild white fish should work.)
• lime marmalade
• one can corn (not creamed)
• one can black beans
• one red onion
• fajita seasoning
• tortilla chips, cilantro, and sour cream for serving

1.  Pat any grease off the fried fish with a paper towel and chop small.  Mix in cans of corn and beans (both drained).  Depending on how much fish you started with, mince the red onion and add enough to taste.  Make sure you break up the onions as you add them.  Sprinkle on fajita seasoning (I use Penzey’s.).  (This could be even better with fresh corn and/or heirloom speckled beans.)

2.  Put about half a cup of lime marmalade (I had Dundee’s Key Lime Marmalade from the grocery store) in a microwavable bowl and heat until liquified (probably a minute or two).  Again, depending on how much you like the lime/sugar flavor of the marmalade and how much fish you started with (and how much you like or dislike the taste of fish!), you may want to use more.  Pour liquid marmalade over the fish mixture and toss gently.

3.  Let sit for about half an hour for flavors to meld.  Serve in a bowl with a dollop of sour cream, sprinkle with cilantro shreds, and offer lime tortilla chips on the side, or stuff tacos with the mixture.

I have been praying for weeks that God would please not give us what we deserve, which would be another four years of Obama, the continued acceleration of the destruction of the unborn, disastrous overseas policy, lies, cozying up to Comrade Putin (who seems increasingly oblivious to the end of the Cold War), the ruin of the economy, the spreading persecution and villification of anyone who dares say homosexual behavior is wrong, the vast expansion of the GIMME GIMME GIMME welfare/entitlement state, etc., etc.

On Facebook, where my husband maintains a very limited personal account, a number of acquaintances have come up with such gems as, “The Republicans’ support is all stupid, white men; doesn’t that explain a lot?”  Wow… let me sit and ponder that one.  With all those degrees, that’s really all the logic she could muster?  My opinion of advanced degrees and certain “prestigious” universities continues to plummet as I meet women with lots of framed paper on their walls and not one ounce of sense, but an overarching fear of being called our for it, masked by an obnoxiously loud and strident proclamation of how smart they are for not being like one of those stupid pro-lifers and/or conservatives.  A complaint about the Republican platform would be fine, but this is just middle school name calling.

Of course, Facebook has also hosted its share of general rants about how Romney should ask women what they think about contraception.  Well, I’m a woman, last I checked (I know, I know: “She’s not a woman!  She’s a Republican!” as the line went about Palin), and I think contraception is about the stupidest thing we’ve done with technology.  We managed to strangle our future generations while wrecking havoc in the stability of our own (divorce rates follow the availability of contraception, and it doesn’t go down, like contraceptives’ proponents say), all in one fell swoop.  How’s that for scientific efficiency?  And then, even though Hugh Hefner embraced contraceptives as the greatest gift to lust-ridden, irresponsible misogynist pigs everywhere… somehow, women still were convinced that they had to have contraceptives for their own good.

America, the Jesuit magazine for “thinking” (which is code for “dissenting”) Catholics, and the Huffington Post (almost equally useless in their ability to identify or promulgate sound Catholic doctrine) apparently both ran articles explaining to Catholics why Obama (since all Democrats are better for the economy, and abortion is really just about financial inability to raise a child) is really the more pro-life choice than Romney (who hates women and wouldn’t really have anything to do with the legality of abortion, you know).  Scarily, some people actually reposted these articles as a “something to make you think” kind of thing.  Yes, it makes me think we’re pretty stupid to accept that “financial hardship” is the real reason for the abortion, and not actually a symptom of the disappearing father, embarassed or coercive parents, unfeeling school administrators, etc. who all made it painfully clear to the pregnant mother that they would abandon her, penniless and homeless, unless she got the abortion and stopped making demands on them.  And yeah, it makes me think… that catechesis in the Catholic Church in this country has absolutely and almost universally stunk, quite literally, to high heaven for decades, so that we’ve turned out a bunch of religiously illiterate adults who can’t perceive the moral difference between government handouts being somewhat decreased and government-funded murder.

And then we promoted some of those adults to the head of CCD programs and parishes, where they spout about the unfairness of working conditions in Nike factories in Asia and the evil, hard-hearted, poor-hating jerks who argued against Obamacare… but NEVER utter one word about the millions dying every year around the globe and around the corner because of the evil of abortion.

Of course, these people were shocked- absolutely flabergasted!- to find out that those crazy, extremist pro-lifers were right about Obamacare being doomed to bring with it mandatory abortions and contraception for everyone, religious objections be damned.  (I’m not holding my breath for an apology.  Apparently, being liberal means never having to admit you were wrong about the actual long-term consequences of your ill-considered idealistic actions.  At least the bishops finally realized the danger they were in and sued the government over the HHS mandate.)

This morning, I spent two and a half hours in line to vote down here in southeastern Virginia.  Our polling place made the local news, and, sadly, we weren’t the worst of it.  (Four years ago, the line was outside for the first hour, and the wait took more like 3.5 hours.)  Two extra computers for checking voter registration finally showed up after we’d been in line for two hours and had only finally made it to the far end of the school cafeteria from the voting booths.  (Yes, I had all four of my kids with me.  They were remarkably good, something I was very thankful for.)

The polls tell us that many people only made up their minds about who they’d vote for in the last few weeks.

It would seem more people have solid opinions about who they root for on “Jersey Shore” or in the “Twilight” series than in politics.

It sure looks like a huge chunk of the U.S. population thinks the government owes them and/or others, not that they have the responsibility to work to provide for themselves, their families, and the poor in their own communities.  (Yes, Vice President Biden, I’m talking to you.  Crap, I give away more money in a month than you did in a year as a senator, and I know my household makes a heck of a lot less than yours.  No, Catholic social teaching does NOT support the idea that voting to give away other people’s tax money to programs for the poor is the same as tithing, the CCHD notwithstanding.)

It would also seem that most women, especially “educated” women, are dumb enough to believe that they have to vote Democratic, or else they’ll be seen as stupid.  Or not worthy of their “lady parts”.  Or that they’ll be chained to the kitchen sink, barefoot, and forced to have babies until they die, while being deprived of proper reading material, like the HuffPo.

I’d like to think we were smarter than this, that a clear explanation of things would open eyes, that we would not fall to what John Adams said could ruin our country: lack of morals and the realization that we could vote ourselves money out of the public treasury.  The election should be obvious and not close at all, if we still remembered those things that made our nation great (faith, the rule of law equally for all, civic involvement, personal as well as group responsibility and charity, etc.).  No matter who wins tonight, this election is too close to be excusable.  Everything in our history says we should be smarter than this.

Thank God, I am solidly aware that my true citizenship is not here, that my deepest loyalties are not to the United States of America, and that all man-made kingdoms will fall and fade, otherwise, I would despair.  (Besides, I learned more than what my pitiful CCD program bothered to teach me, so I also know that despair is expressly forbidden; it is a sin against God’s goodness.  I have thanked God and blessed the Archdiocese for the Military Services repeatedly over the years for those marvelous, holy chaplains assigned to the Naval Academy.)

But I am losing heart in the power of words, logic, and even personal example to change most peoples’ minds.

Kinda a problem for someone trying to keep up a blog.

Oh.  Goody.

And then the Beatles march in, wearing neon pseudo-military uniforms and save everything!

This is how Britain wanted to portray itself?  Seriously?

(and did they miss the line in the unofficial national anthem by Blake about “and was Jerusalem builded here, among those dark, satanic mills”?  I mean, they chose to sing it; doesn’t anybody read lyrics anymore?  It isn’t about the glories of the Industrial Revolution.)

They chose to feature J.K. Rowling, James Bond, the Beatles, the National Health Service, Queen (not Elizabeth II), one tiny and relatively obscure reading from Shakespeare, and children’s literature.

But no J.R.R. Tolkein, C.S. Lewis, G.K. Chesterton, or, um, Christianity.

Except we’re playing “Good Christian Men, Rejoice” to chase out the evil things in the shadows as the kids are going to bed, but only as a light jig, not with words.

And the theme to “Chariots of Fire,” but as a humor piece (ok, it was very funny) with Mr. Bean, but no mention of Eric Liddel dying as a missionary in China.

All centered around an ersatz Glastonbury Tor, the long-acknowledged spiritual heart of England and home of the legendary Glastonbury Thorn… well, at least until Henry VIII declared himself the head of the church in England, hung the abbot of Glastonbury Abbey on the tor itself, and had most of the church complex torn down to build a 16th century McMansion for some newly declared lord who would support Henry’s usurpation of spiritual power and pretend it was ok.  Well, upon consideration, I would say it’s an appropriate symbol of modern Britain, but not likely for the same reasons the opening ceremony’s designers chose it.

No pipe band, no Irish dancers, no real acknowledgement of the colonial era (they could’ve done something nice with immigrants from the different countries in the Empire and what they contributed to British culture), maybe even a reminder of how many British went emigrated and what they built and contributed where they settled would have been good.

The commentary in my living room is running towards the, “Oh, I hope Prof. Pearce has a good beer, and I wonder what he thinks of this mess his homeland came up with.”

The Catholic Church in this country is seriously astray on social justice issues.

Yes, we still run soup kitchens, crisis pregnancy centers, etc.  We have for centuries.  The Catholic Church runs hospitals, schools, orphanages, family counseling centers, and financial assistance offices all over the world.  It is part of our mission.  We don’t demand that people convert, or even require them to sit still for a sermon before we help.  If you need help, we’re just about everywhere, ready to help.

However, we also have seen a heavy push in America to encourage the government to take over functions that were so often historically the province of churches and charitable organizations.  The recent flap over the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) funding pro-gay, pro-abortion organizations is only the tip of the iceberg.  The much larger problem it that the entire goal of the CCHD is not to fund charitable work but to fund lobbying work to encourage the government to spend more on entitlement programs… and that’s not really what they tell the parishoners who are exhorted to donate.

Why is government takeover a good thing?  Why is this passing as Catholic teaching?

What happened to exhorting people to be charitable?  That’s been as lacking from our pulpit as discussions of abortion.  Maybe your parish is better about this than mine, but I’m betting not.  This is why the Catholics in public office have such abysmal charity records: they think they did their charity by getting the government to spend my money and yours on welfare and other programs aimed at helping the poor.

I forget where I read it, but a commenter on a related blog post somewhere pointed out that if the USCCB and all the diocesan social justice committees would spend half their energy on more favorable tax breaks for families with children, instead of on socializing welfare after the Church has been repeatedly burned by being forced to provide adoption services for gays or contraceptives in the nuns’ healthcare plan (shouldn’t we know best of anyone what happens when the government takes over?)… well, we could’ve done a lot more good.

The phrase “social justice” was taken from the (mostly) condemned liberation theology movement in Central and South America.  (Liberation Theology had originated elsewhere, but it’s worst manifestation in the Catholic Church was in those areas.)  Liberation theology seeks to combine Christianity with Marxist economic thought, encouraging class warfare and villifying “the rich” while extolling the virtue of the poor.  (I am not denying that voluntarily embracing poverty is a strong witness.  But I do not assume that all poor people are virtuous because of their poverty.)

Contrary to those who want to complain that Pope John Paul II “saw communists everywhere” because of his experiences in Soviet-dominated Poland, the truth is that he sought to take what was good and useful from liberation theology (care for the poor, focus not just on poverty but the unjust systems that cause it, etc.).  Perhaps some people missed that he also condemned the class warfare, poor-can-do-no-wrong, all-rich-are-damned parts of liberation theology.  Unfortunately, some of us ordinary Catholics in the pews have too often had cause to complain that the Marxism is creeping back in, sometimes none too subtly.

It would seriously do us all a lot of good to re-read Rerum Novarum (“Of New Things”), Centesimus Annus (“A Hundred Years”), and Pope Benedict XVI’s Caritas in Veritate (“Charity in Truth”).

(PHW: I just found this post in the bottom of the “draft” folder, never published.  I wrote it almost two years ago.  Funny how all those pro-lifers saying, “If you accept this universal health care takeover by the government it will bite you in the butt!  No matter what they said, it will wind up mandating all legal medical procedures, and you aren’t going to like it, but there will be no way left to fight!”  Really, I do NOT enjoy saying, “We told you so…”  Maybe, after the current fracas is resolved, the issues of class warfare and the overreach of big government (especially in social justice programs) will be discussed in the Church.)

Instead, I’d like to point out a sobering article from someone who had an abortion.

I was still convinced they were there…somewhere. Hiding in the bushes, perhaps. Or sitting in their parked cars, reading the Bible, waiting for people to pull up, and then they would jump out of their cars and swarm around mine like a pitchfork-wielding mob. I waited five minutes. And I prayed the whole time that they were there. Then I waited five more minutes. Maybe they were just running late.

Nothing.

And you know the rest of the story. No one was there. Not a single living soul told me I didn’t have to do this. No one in the clinic told me otherwise, either, of course.

It’s a thought-provoking article.  It will make you think again about finding some time to stand outside the local abortion clinic to pray.

This shall be merely the teaser post.

Coming this week:

Dr. Ray Guarendi

Prof. Joseph Pearce

Mr. Dale Ahlquist (President, American Chesterton Society)

… and several others!

As always, I’ll tell you that you should get to a conference in person, if at all possible.  Second-best would probably be to order the recordings of the talks from the conference coordinators.  Failing that, maybe I can at least whet your interest in attending next year by providing summaries and descriptions of the highly entertaining, informative, and uplifting talks I attended.

See you tomorrow!

Ok, so this was the cute handprint design that the girls deemed “too babyish.”  *sigh*  I thought it was cute…

First day of painting: green and a red garden wall.

Add trees…

That weird stripe pattern is the beginning of the railing.

The first animals appear: peacock, elephants, Victoria crowned pigeon, insects.

The red panda at the zoo is the kids’ favorite, and it likes to sit just like this on the branches over the path.

They’re not the best zebras ever, but this should give you an idea of their size (and thus lack of detail).

Trees, bushes, and the base color of the giraffe.  I was a bit worried I’d mess up the animals, so I avoided the ones I couldn’t use the art projector on.

Empress is a *little* exicted about this… she had to be asked to please not pet the animals until the paint had cured for a week or two!

The lotus pond, moon bears, two lions sleeping on the man-made mountain.

The little details help.  These are peach-faced lovebirds, a dragonfly copied from one in the backyard, and, in the upper left, a tiger and her cubs (who are unsuccessfully trying to hunt a golden pheasant).

Pandas playing and African crowned cranes courting (thanks to photos we took at the zoo).

Ta da!  The toddler bed was turned into a couch with a shelf, a dragonfly lantern, and a fake potted orchid.  They love to read over there.

The view from the desk under the bed.  The dragon-tiled ceiling and details are copied from photos I took in the Forbidden City.

I have a few details left to do on the bed, but it’s nearly done.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief foray into “what Kathy does when the obsessive instinct takes off”. 

I’ll be back eventually with more photos.

Yes, that’s a peacock, against a traditional Chinese railing (how?  LOTS of blue painters’ tape!), under a cherry blossom tree, with a vast expanse of garden waiting to be filled between the railing and that wall in the distance.

This is how I “relax” from homeschooling, since they won’t leave me alone long enough to read if I actually sit down!

Threats against life and against the consciences of those who say “yes” to life must be met with timely and unwavering action, in our families and institutions, and, yes, in the public square.

- Cardinal DiNardo, vigil of the March for Life, 2012

On Friday, at noon, there will be coordinated, nation-wide rallies in support of religious freedom.  The list of cities participating is available at Stand Up For Religious Freedom.

This is not a “Catholic thing”.  If one group’s rights are trampled, nobody’s rights are safe.  Our founders argued for religious toleration for all faiths, even though many of them were certainly strongly anti-Catholic.  They were wise enough to know that if one group can be singled out for repression, then the list may be expanded to include others.  It had happened in England; first, the Catholics were arrested, fined, and harrassed into emigrating or giving up their faith.  Next, it was the other dissenters: the Quakers, Puritans, and others who disagreed with a state-run church.  You may notice that a lot of these people fled to the U.S. to find religious freedom.

The media has painted this as “those crazy papists, again!”  Yes, anti-Catholicism is alive and well in this country, and many will be persuaded by the coverage to believe this is just a “stupid Catholics being unreasonable” thing that can be safely ignored.  It isn’t “just a Catholic thing”, but don’t take my word for it.  Dr. James Dobson has written a strong statement against compliance with the HHS mandate.  Chuck Colson, may he rest in peace, adamantly opposed the HHS mandate.  Many other religious leaders, Christian and otherwise, have joined in saying that all Americans must stand up and oppose this, no matter what you believe about contraception.

“Freedom of religion” does not simply mean that I can worship however I please, as long as I don’t let anyone know about it in public by my words or actions.  My freedom of religion does not end as soon as I say or believe something that the government deems inappropriate.  My freedom of religion is not contingent on my ability to afford a fine when my beliefs run afoul of what the government has declared legal.

But if my freedom of religion can be circumscribed this way, so can yours.

It’s an hour.  Get out there.  This Friday, at noon.

• nobody is forcing religious employers to pay for contraceptives; the insurance companies will pay for them
• it isn’t true that anybody is forcing anyone to buy contraceptives at all: you could just pay the fine/assessment/tax/whatever Obama is calling it this week
• you people need to stop believing everything the bishops tell you

Hmmm.  I could make snarky comments about him, but I’ll just make a lazy post by copying my reply.

Ok, so here’s the HHS statement on its final ruling.  Yeah, that’s what I said it said, thanks.

You may note that it clearly states that all health insurance plans that do not qualify for an exemption must provide contraceptive services.  Even those who qualify for an examption and don’t provide contraceptives will probably be required, the statement says, to inform their employees about where to get contraceptives for free.

So, every Catholic school, hospital and charity will be required to provide contraception (because they don’t fit under the new, narrow definition of a “religious” entity).  Even parishes and convents that fit under the definition should be aware that HHS is already contemplating how to force them to promote contraception to their employees.  The so-called compromise only means that these institutions will be forced to buy insurance that, for “free”, provides contraceptives.  NEWS FLASH: when the hotel says the wi-fi and breakfast are “free”, they aren’t; you’re paying for it, they just add it to the room price.  When the insurance company says, “Sure, we provide contraceptives for free,” um, no, YOU’RE PAYING FOR THAT.

(And you’re happy that dioceses will be forced to buy insurance from someone else?  Why?  Adding the bureaucracy of an insurance company won’t make health insurance cheaper for the employees.  Is it because the government can bully the insurance companies more easily?  Or are you just anti-Catholic and want Catholics to please keep their unauthorized opinions to themselves, unless they’re standing in a church?)

And, holy crap!  how generous!, HHS has allowed that those institutions that do not fit under the definition but have objections can have an extra year to, as Cardinal Dolan put it, “Figure out how to violate our consciences,” as long as they prove that they even qualify for the extension.

The last time I checked, in this country, we do not generally give out rights only to those who can PAY THE FINES FOR THEM.  If you have to pay a fine for it, it ISN’T RELIGIOUS FREEDOM.  I am not interested in being a dhimmi in my own country, thank you very much.

Yes, I’m yelling.  Here’s my short version:

The federal government has a definition of what constituted a religious institution; this administration chose to use a definition that excludes most religious institutions.  Why?  Are they trying to drive religious institutions out of the public square?

If I pay for insurance that provides contraceptives, I am directly complicit in something I hold to be sinful, no matter how the accounting is done (this has nothing to do with paying taxes; that is a much more remote connection between my money and behavior I may hold to be immoral).  So, no, the latest “compromise” isn’t worth anything.

If I have to pay a fine to exercise my religious freedom, then my “right” has been reduced to a calculation of how much money the government can get out of me, money that the government will directly use to fund something I object strongly to.  And once I’m out of money, my right to religious freedom is gone.  Somehow, I seem to remember from high school government class that that is not how our Bill of Rights is supposed to work.  (But Obama was a Constitutional law prof; I’m sure he’ll tell us that, since he sees the Constitution as a living document, “bill” must be reinterpreted in the modern way, so it now means, “You get rights, and the government will send you a bill.”)

And if you think, “Well, I don’t care about contraception; I want it covered,” then please consider what else is legal that you or your church might object to funding: abortion, sex-change operations, and euthanasia.  If they force the Catholics to bow (and we are the largest single denomination in this country and our hospitals care for 1/6 of American patients), do you think they are going to stop here?