Hizzbollah is on the ropes

Here is an interesting take on the current state of affairs in the Levant...

Hizballah Is On The Ropes

The Clock Ticks for Hizballah as Assad Loves His Palaces More Than Nasrallah

By Steve Schippert

Amid the relentless images of the dead extracted from a building in Qana, amid the fiery anger those images generated – from Lebanon to Europe and from Egypt to Indonesia - and amid deafening global cries for an immediate ceasefire, a curiously contradictory picture is emerging from the battlefields of Hizballistan: Hizballah is on the ropes, running short of resources and desperate for a ceasefire for its very survival. (read more...)

Baptismal font

Another shot of the interior of the Cathedral.

Crucis

This is from the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament in Sacramento, Ca. It's a new addition to the Cathedral, added as part of the recent renovation.

Gun rights is a human rights issue

If you need some convincing of this, please take a look at the article by Dave Kopel located here, entitled "Gun Bans and Genocide: The Disarming Facts". Kopel does an excellent job of describing how the government in Darfur is using gun control to expedite genocide. Here's the first paragraph... and don't forget to go read the whole article:

Gun Bans and Genocide: The Disarming Facts

By Dave Kopel

The international gun prohibition lobbies and their United Nations allies insist that there is no personal right of self-defense—that people should be forced to rely exclusively on the government protection. The prohibitionists also insist that there is no human right for people to possess the means of self-defense, such as firearms. But what are people supposed to do when the government itself starts killing people? The genocide in Darfur, Sudan, is the direct result of the types of gun laws which the United Nations is trying to impose all over the world. Millions of people have already died because of such laws, and millions more will die unless the U.N. is stopped. (more...)

Florida crime rate down to lowest level since '71

Okay, here's why it's a bad idea to deny our right to own guns...

Bush: Florida crime rate down to lowest level since '71

By BRENT KALLESTAD Associated Press Writer

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. —
Florida's crime rate dropped for the 14th straight year in 2005 to its lowest mark since 1971 because of tougher laws, increased financial support from the Legislature and law-abiding citizens with guns, Gov. Jeb Bush said Tuesday. (read more...)

Bomb blasts in Kashmir and Mumbai

This is very strange. Nary a peep in the news and hardly on blogs at all... what's up with this???

Christians Condemn India Bomb Attacks as 'Mindless Violence'

By Michelle Vu
Christian Post Reporter

Wed, Jul. 12, 2006 Posted: 08:31:54 AM EST

Indian Christian groups are speaking out against the series of bomb blasts considered one of the worst terrorist attacks in the country in recent years, condemning the act as ‘‘mindless violence.’’ (read more...)

France yanks Chirac's pants down...

The Scream (or The Cry) 1893; Edvard Munch

Seems like President Jacques Chirac of France is busy these days listening to little voices in his head. I don't want to be one to speculate, but I suspect some of those voices might be speaking English...

Soldiers of fortune go free as judge denounces Chirac over island coup

From Adam Sage in Paris

COVERT attempts by President Chirac to exert influence over Africa were exposed by a French court yesterday, when it denounced his secret services for conniving with a band of mercenaries in a coup in the tiny Comoros Islands. (Read the rest here...)

My guess is you won't hear much about it in the NYTimes, but I could be wrong. Thanks to the goddess of the blogsphere, Alexandra at All Things Beautiful for posting this... She has some excellent commentary there.

Altar at Cristo Rey Monastery Chapel

This is a shot of the altar at the Cristo Rey Monastery Chapel here in San Francisco. I'm planning on spending a few hours there with my camera soon and will be making a slide show of the results and posting it on my website...

San Francisco Exploratorium Photos

Here is a shot of the exploratorium in San Francisco. The fog bank lying in the bay really caught my eye! There's also a shot of Coit Tower and more of the exploratorium at my website...

Antelope Valley Fair 2005

Okay, here is a new photo and also a few links to some photo albums at my website. More to come...

Pictures of some Dominican Churches in San Francisco

A few pictures of San Francisco

Photo albums soon to come...

I'll be posting links to my photo albums soon... I just need some time to upload them and then I'll make links to them under "Links", just to be original...

USF Lone Mountain

This is a picture taken at USF's Lone Mountain campus.

England AFB, Alexandria, LA

Here's a blast from the past for some Air Force veterans. This is where I was stationed for a year whilst in the war... it was in the heart of Louisianna. Hup! It is long gone these days... closed and I think made into an airport.

ANT-OAR REDUX!

The debate continues to rage in the latest press release from the American Life League:

C. Ward Kischer, PhD, human embryology professor emeritus, and Fr. Joseph Howard, M. Div., of American Life League, have issued the following statement regarding their analysis of an Altered Nuclear Transfer-Oocyte-Assisted Reprogramming (ANT-OAR) process proposed by Dr. William Hurlbut. This process, by which an experimental protocol would generate presumed pluripotent cells, but presumably not human embryos for research, raises many serious moral concerns and should be especially troubling for Catholics in the field of science. Dr. Kischer and Fr. Howard address the moral concerns of the proposal and reiterate the teachings of the Catholic Church when dealing with such delicate matters involving the gift of human life.

The problem with the argument these gentlemen are advancing lies primarily in this statement:

C. Ward Kischer, Ph.D., states that, “It appears that within an experimental protocol of ANT-OAR, through cloning, not all in the progeny of blastomeres may become genetically modified and therefore would likely be totipotent. Such a totipotent blastomere would indeed be equivalent to a human zygote who is a human embryo.”

It's unclear how Kischer has arrived at the conclusion that "...not all in the progeny of blastomeres may become genetically modifed and therefore would likely be totipotent." Is he redefining what it means to be totipotent or what it means to be a blastomere? Has he done experiments that confirm his assertion? I kinda doubt it. If anyone knows if such experiments have taken place, do let me know! I'm always ready to stand corrected! The quotes from Donum Vitae don't apply to this procedure if, in fact, no human embryo is involved, and I think this seems to be the case... because what we DO know leads us to believe that it's not even possible for a real blastomere to be generated from ANT-OAR.

In an unpublished paper, Fr. Nicanor Austriaco, OP explains why:

For our analysis, the definitive question that arises is the following: Does the absence of the maternally imprinted gene products that are only produced when genes are inherited from the father impact the system dynamics of the whole parthenote ab initio substantially changing it so that the parthenote becomes a tumor, or does their absence only lead to a defective part of an embryo that becomes a tumor eventually killing the whole?

In response, we return to a key study, already mentioned above, that has shown that the absence of both paternally and maternally imprinted genes impacts the development of the embryo from the very beginning at the two-cell stage.19 Moreover, the absence of the maternally imprinted molecules impacts that parthenote at the level of the whole since the scientific evidence suggests that the imprinted genes regulates the overall number of cells that develop in the blastocyst. In addition, another study has demonstrated that the organization of a parthenote differs from the organization of a normal embryo from the very start: In normal development, when the single-celled mouse zygote divides into two cells, these two cells, called blastomeres, are already not identical. One of the two cells divides ahead of its sister and tends to contribute most of its cellular descendents to the embryo proper, whereas the other, later dividing cell, contributes cells predominantly to the extra-embryonic tissue including the placenta.20 However, in contrast, when a single-celled mouse parthenote divides into two cells, these two cells do not behave in the way that normal blastomeres would behave.21 The first cell that divides does not necessarily contribute its descendents to the embryo proper.This is a small but significant difference in organization that points to the difference between the parthenote and the normal embryo at the very earliest stages of the development. In sum, all of this data suggests that the forces that lead to tumor formation are already present at the earliest stages of embryonic development. In other words, the system dynamics of the parthenote as a whole already differs from the system dynamics of the normal embryo since normal embryos do not become teratomas. Like the complete mole, a parthenote is not an embryo.

Whether or not OAR results in a parthenote has to be confirmed through non-human experimentation. Fr. Austriaco's explanation makes it clear that the material conditions necessary for the existence of a human embryo simply aren't present in the product of OAR. What remains to be done is experimental verification of this conclusion, first with enucleated non-human eggs and then, if successful, on enucleated human eggs.

The entire press release from ALL can be read here...

The text of the Joint Statement from the Catholic ethicists can be found here...

The link to the White Paper from the President's Council on Bioethics can be found here...

Director of Vatican Observatory speaks out

Fr. George Coyne, SJ, the director of the Vatican Observatory, has written an opinion piece in the latest issue of The Tablet. He takes issue with Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna over the issue of evolution. An excerpt:

...There appears to exist a nagging fear in the Church that a universe, which science has established as evolving for 13.7 x 1 billion years since the Big Bang and in which life, beginning in its most primitive forms at about 12 x 1 billion years from the Big Bang, evolved through a process of random genetic mutations and natural selection, escapes God’s dominion. That fear is groundless. ... Perhaps the following picture of God’s relation to the created universe, as that universe is seen by science and interpreted by a religious believer, may help to assuage that fear. In the universe, as known by science, there are essentially three processes at work: chance, necessity and the fertility of the universe. The classical question as to whether the human being came about by chance, and so has no need of God, or by necessity, and so through the action of a designer God, is no longer valid. And so any attempt to answer it is doomed to failure. The fertility of the universe, now well established by science, is an essential ingredient, and the meaning of chance and necessity must be seen in light of that fertility. Chance processes and necessary processes are continuously interacting in a universe that is 13.7 x 1 billion years old and contains about 1022 stars. Those stars as they “live” and “die” release to the universe the chemical abundance of the elements necessary for life. In their thermonuclear furnaces stars convert the lighter elements into the heavier elements. There is no other way, for instance, to have the abundance of carbon necessary to make a toenail than through the thermonuclear processes in stars. We are all literally born of stardust.

I think Fr. Edward Oakes makes a more coherent statement....but Fr. Coyne does make some good points!

Catholics and Evolution

(Image found here...)

For those who are following the current hubub over some comments made by Cardinal Schönborn on evolution and the Church, here is an excellent interview on the issue from Fr. Edward Oakes, SJ: Part 1, and Part 2.

An excerpt :

For one thing, the Church has no "doctrine" on evolution, any more than it has a doctrine on tectonic plates or a magisterial teaching on how human consciousness arises from the electrical firings inside the neurology of the brain. These matters are both beyond the competence of the magisterium and are irrelevant to salvation, anyway.

Secondly, even if the magisterium did have an official teaching on evolution, it does not officially revise its "views" on matters of science by having a cardinal, however "leading," writing an article "in propria persona" -- on his own behalf -- and using an op-ed piece in a secular newspaper to boot.

That said, I believe that Cardinal Schönborn's essay "Finding Design in Nature" in the July 7 issue of the Times makes a valid point, roughly the reverse side of the coin of what Pope John Paul II said in his now-famous letter to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in October of 1996.

John Paul said at the time that "evolution" -- which, as Cardinal Schönborn rightly notes, the Holy Father left undefined -- can no longer be considered merely a "hypothesis" because so much data have now come in to confirm the theory.

The problem is that this very short letter brought some misinterpretations of its own in its wake -- because of the obnoxious way some Darwinians like to hijack the word "evolution" for their own atheistic purposes -- and it is those false conclusions, as I see it, that the cardinal was trying to warn against.

But, no, I do not see the cardinal's quite legitimate warning as a "new chapter in the evolution-vs.-creationism debate."

First of all, if "creationism" means six-day creation as a few Christian fundamentalists still hold, then there is no chance in the world that the Catholic Church will join that cause. But "creationism" can also refer to the total ontological dependence of the universe on God's creative act of will, and nothing in the theory of evolution can threaten that essential doctrine of the Catholic faith.

Remember that, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, even if the world happens to be temporally eternal, such an eternity of time would not undermine the created contingency of the world, utterly dependent on God's free decision to create it.

Another excellent read on the issue is found here... an interview of Professor Nicola Cabibbo, president for the past 12 years of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.

An excerpt :

NCR: What did you think of The New York Times article by Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna on evolution?

Cabibbo: Two things struck me, one positively and the other negatively. Positively, it opens a very interesting discussion. But I cannot agree with the way he handled the address of John Paul II to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in 1996. I don't know if the problem was in a bad translation from German, but he calls it "vague and rather unimportant." I've never considered it that way, in fact I have always considered it very important. Not only for the now famous statement, that evolution is "more than a hypothesis," but also for what comes next: "It is indeed remarkable that this theory has been progressively accepted by researchers, following a series of discoveries in various fields of knowledge. The convergence, neither sought nor fabricated, of the results of work that was conducted independently is in itself a significant argument in favor of this theory," the Pope said. With these words the Pope demonstrated a clear understanding of the scientific method, on how an hypothesis can be transformed into a widely accepted fact. This allocution is in fact a very articulated expression of the thought of the late John Paul II.

Good stuff! Go read the rest and copy it to your harddrive!

Jesus and Evolution

The latest issue of Theology and Science is now out, and it's theme is evolution. Here is an excerpt from the editorial by Robert John Russell...

My own view is that God does act within nature and that Darwinian evolution is the result. Note, however, this is a theological claim, not a scientific one. Belief in God can inspire scientists to pursue specific scientific research proposals, but such research cannot include reference to God and remain within science. What this means is that teaching ID in public schools is not a matter of fairess to competing theories since ID is not an alternative biological theory. It is at most a theological claim in disguise. The worst problem is that ID proponents endorse this disguise by not telling us what they mean by agency. This strategy offers an apparent apologetic hope to believing Christians but it fails to deliver on that hope. This makes Christianity seem foolish to agnostic scientists who might otherwise have listened to us, and it promises only eventual disappointment to Christians who believe in it.

This is a pretty good issue...don't miss it!

Gargoyles R Us!

Now how kewl is this? Hat tip to Plato's Stepchild for the lead. Here's a place to get your Gargoyle...

"Legend has it that gargoyles ward off evil spirits - are any protecting your castle and loved ones?"


Don't miss the Gargoyle Information Page!

Scotty Beams Up

The venerable James Doohan died today at the age of 85. He was a likable cuss, known to me only through watching Star Trek as a wee lad. The quote from the article found here sums him up, I think:

Once, at a convention of astronomers, James Doohan was asked what it felt like "to be beamed." The actor who'd abided by the order, "Beam me up, Scotty," countless times on the Star Trek set reported that it was "very pleasurable."

He was a class act! Fare thee well, Scotty!

(Picture found here...)

Stem Cell Research (ANT)

For those following the proposal by the President's Council on Bioethics to develop a procedure that would yield embryonic stem cells without killing any embryos, here is a link to the text of The Production of Pluripotent Stem Cells by Oocyte Assisted Reprogramming - Joint Statement. Here is an excerpt from it:

As described in the President's Council on Bioethics's recent White Paper, altered nuclear transfer (ANT) is a broad conceptual proposal for producing pluripotent stem cells without creating and destroying embryos. In the description set forth below, we outline a research program for a form of ANT that should allow us to produce pluripotent stem cells without creating or destroying human embryos and without producing an entity that undergoes or mimics embryonic development. The method of alteration here proposed (oocyte assisted reprogramming) would immediately produce a cell with positive characteristics and a type of organization that from the beginning would be clearly and unambiguously distinct from, and incompatible with, those of an embryo. Incapable of being or becoming an embryo, the cell produced would itself be a pluripotent cell that could be cultured to establish a pluripotent stem cell line. Significantly, this cell would not be totipotent, as a zygote is.

The joint statement is endorsed by a panel of ethicists, which includes William May, Fr. Nicanor Austriaco, OP, Germain Grisez, William Hurlbut, Fr. Kevin T. FitzGerald, S.J., Fr. Kevin Flannery, S.J., Edward J. Furton, Alfonso Gomez-Lobo, John M. Haas, John F. Kilner, Patrick Lee, Fr. Gonzalo Miranda, L.C, Archbishop John J. Myers, Fr. Tad Pacholczyk, and Fr. Thomas Williams... all who endorse the ANT procedure known as oocyte assisted reprogramming.

There is a page set up at Communio, which has several arguments against the proposed procedures, as well as some rebuttal. PLEASE NOTE! Communio does not endorse the joint statement.