Bright hornéd crescentSATURDAY UPDATE: Tonight at twilight, the sky was a beautiful, clear midnight blue, with the very bright crescent somewhat larger than last night, again poised between the shining planets, Venus and Jupiter, with Orion overhead, slightly to the east. Lovely.
Suspended in darkened sky
Upward facing points
There has never been a day when I haveFrom StoryPeople.
not been proud of you, I said, though
some days I'm louder about other stuff
so it's easy to miss that.
"There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."The old saying is in Louisiana now, too.
David Kato, Ugandan LGBT rights activist, was beaten to death one year ago today (Jan. 26). He is considered a father of Uganda’s gay rights movement.More at Jesus in Love.
Some blame religious rhetoric for his death. American evangelicals helped stir up the hostility that led to Kato’s death because they promoted a law imposing the death penalty for homosexuality. Shortly before his murder Kato won a lawsuit against a Ugandan magazine for identifying him as gay and calling for his execution.
Blessed are you, gracious God,
creator of heaven and earth;
you are glorified in the assembly of your saints.
David Kato and all your martyrs bless you and praise you,
confessing before the powers of this world
the great name of your only Son.
Therefore we join our voices with theirs,
and with all who have served you in every age,
to proclaim the glory of your name.
(Preface of a Martyr, Book of Alternative Services, Canada)
If you've ever worked for a boss who reacts before getting the facts and thinking things through, you will love this!Don't blame me. Blame Doug.
Hamson Metal-Steel, feeling it was time for a shakeup, hired a new CEO. The new boss was determined to rid the company of all slackers.
On a tour of the facilities, the CEO noticed a guy leaning against a wall. The room was full of workers and he wanted to let them know that he meant business. He asked the guy, "How much money do you make a week?"
A little surprised, the young man looked at him and said, "I make $400 a week. Why?"
The CEO said, "Wait right here." He walked back to his office, came back in two minutes, and handed the guy $1,600 in cash and said, "Here's four weeks' pay. Now GET OUT and don't come back."
Feeling pretty good about himself the CEO looked around the room and asked, "Does anyone want to tell me what that goof-ball did here?"
From across the room a voice said, "Pizza delivery guy.”
From the Code of Practice suggested by the two archbishops:The Church of England's House of Bishops – for which, read the archbishops of Canterbury and York – has explained how they hope to mollify the opponents of female clergy. The proposals are breathtaking.
The House of Bishops does not wish to see any outcome that would entrench radical division or give any impression of a 'two-tier‘ episcopate. Because of their commitment both to this principle and to the most adequate and sustainable provision for theological dissent over the ordination of women, they are seeking a balanced provision within the overall framework that will allow all members of the Church of England to flourish and to pursue the mission to our nation and society that we share.Despite the statement above, in the suggested 'Code of Practice' the two archbishops in the Church of England are quite determined to enable prejudice against women bishops and, further, to assure that prejudicial attitudes and practices remain entrenched in the church.
We are aware as bishops that there are very difficult decisions ahead for many of our clergy and faithful; we want to honour the desire of all who wish to remain loyal Anglicans, fully engaged in this mission. And we are not thinking in terms of a time-limited provision, mindful that such a suggestion was rejected at the Revision stage of amending the legislation under discussion.
Funds are scarce, and yet the CofE will support three bishops to continue to ordain priests who would not consider ordination by a female bishop as valid, because, not only would the women not be real bishops, but they were never even real priests in the first place. How is the support of bishops to prevent candidates for ordination from besmirchment by the laying on of hands by a woman bishop not entrenchment of division?The archbishops envisage that the Church of England, once it has female bishops, will continue ordaining men who do not accept these women, finding them jobs they will deign to accept, and promoting some of them to be bishops who will work to ensure the continued supply of male priests who refuse to accept female clergy. In fact, the church will pay three bishops (the formerly "flying" sees of Ebbsfleet, Richborough, and Beverley) to work full time against their female colleagues, and to nourish the resistance.
In the light of our discussion, the House will continue to uphold these three principles:Andrew Brown
• Bishops will continue not to discriminate in selecting candidates for ordination on the grounds of their theological convictions regarding the admission of women to Holy Orders;
• In choosing bishops to provide episcopal ministry under diocesan schemes for parishes requesting this provision, diocesan bishops will seek to identify those whose ministry will be consistent with the theological convictions concerning the ordination of women to the priesthood and episcopate underlying the Letter of Request;
• The archbishops and bishops commit themselves to seeking to maintain a supply of bishops able to minister on this basis. This will obviously have a bearing on decisions about appointments and on the role of bishops occupying the sees of Beverley, Ebbsfleet and Richborough (which will, as a matter of law, continue to exist even after the Episcopal Ministry Act of Synod has been rescinded).
The two archbishops could not get their desired legislation through the previous General Synod and are aware that church members, bishops, and clergy are embarrassed and weary of efforts to cater to the prejudicial "theological convictions" of the squeamish, so now they attempt a new tactic by calling the effort to prolong discrimination against women by a different name, a 'Code of Practice'. Do the archbishops think that by this blatant attempt at subterfuge through name change, they will get the code passed? Perhaps they will. I hope not.Despite all these concessions, there will be female bishops, as there are already female priests, and these will be treated exactly the same as male ones – except by the men who don't want to treat them equally and who believe that God has called them to undermine women's authority wherever it appears.
This is apparently Rowan Williams's idea of justice.
He discovered his reset button early onFrom StoryPeople.
& there were not many things that
bothered him all the rest of his days just
because of that.
If elected president, Mitt Romney might consider ending a tax break that helped the former Massachusetts governor accumulate his fortune, an aide suggested Tuesday.No, wait! He's happy to be richer.
The comments came as the Romney campaign made available more than 500 pages of tax-return data for 2010 and 2011 amid signs the issue was hurting him with some voters.
Later in the day, in a signal of how the tax issue is roiling the GOP campaign, the Romney camp tried to step back from the aide's remarks, underscoring that the former Massachusetts governor didn't want to raise anyone's taxes.Romney closed down his Swiss bank account but retains accounts in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and other tax havens.
So rich, that he makes the one percenters look like the 99 percent.Whoa! That IS rich. But we all knew Romney was extremely wealthy. He should have released the tax returns early on and not shown such reluctance. Who did he think he was kidding?
According to a calculation from Emmanuel Saez, the economist at the University of California at Berkley, who has become the top expert on top incomes, Mitt Romney’s income of $21.7 million puts him well above the 1%.
In fact, his income puts him in about the 99.9975% income bracket. Put another way, Mitt is in the top 0.0025%.
