Bridge over River Kwai theme and the unknown and weird B-Section

Whistle along. You know you can’t resist:

But what to do when you get to about 1:12 into it? Ha! Haven’t heard that part before have you? As a band composition it’s fine, but imagine trying to whistle it in a Japanese POW camp:

Quote of the Day

CMR comments on the movie “The Box”:

And all I could think was that maybe this movie was an unintentionally telling benchmark on our national psyche. Are we so far gone as a society with abortion, embryonic stem cell research, and euthanasia and an overall lack of morals that we can’t even have decent moral conundrum movies. You see, for a moral conundrum movie to work you first need morals.

Emboldening the orcs

Patrick Madrid is reporting that the debate between Dawkins and Archbishop Onaiyekan and Ms. Widdecombe over “Whether the Catholic Church is a force for good in the world” went very poorly for the Catholics.

The most fundamentalist Christian, anti-abortion country in the world reports no link between abortion and cancer

Oh wait, that headline is completely wrong: CNA

Chinese researchers claim to have found a 17 percent increased breast cancer risk among women who have had induced abortions.

Peng Xing and other researchers in the Department of Oncology at the First Affiliated Hospital of China Medical University enrolled in their study 1,417 patients diagnosed with breast cancer and 1,587 women without a prior breast cancer.

The researchers’ findings indicated that induced abortion increased a woman’s risk of breast cancer by a “statistically significant” rate of 17 percent.

According to the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer (CABC), U.S. researchers have said that Chinese studies on a link between abortion and breast cancer exclude “report bias” because abortion isn’t stigmatized in China and Chinese women are considered reliable reporters for their abortions.

The CABC said a Turkish study published earlier this year reported a 66 percent increased breast cancer risk among women who have had abortions

Hat tip CMR

Coolest name for a Catholic blog E-VAH

Fallible Blogma.

Pluralism IS a religion

My “Holy book” is the constitution of the United States. –commentor Michael J. Murray-Magill

 

Various bloggers like John C. Wright and LarryD noted the story of a UK man who got a court to recognize that his belief in man-made global war…err…climate change was equivalent to a religious belief and all the protections that go with it. Then Patrick Madrid linked this YouTube video (which you don’t have to watch):

If you opted not to watch, it’s boiler-plate anti-Catholicism worthy of Jack Chick. Well actually, to Jack’s credit, at least he occassionally gives concrete examples. They may be distorted and strawman examples, but least it’s something.

Anyway, what amused me was not the triumphalistic blather this video contains, but his hand-tipping in the description he provides with the video (my emphasis):

This video is the latest, and probably last, in my series about Catholic apologists. (I’m eager to finally stake this vampire and move on to my real passions, peak oil and sustainable living, and how evangelical Christians need to be part of the solution to the very pressing problems facing the world today.)

Mencius Moldbug originally turned me on to the possible connection between fundamentalism and modern progressivism. This looks like one more piece for the evidence pile.

All Hail Bacon!

Fr. Erik declares YouTube war on humanity.

Witness this atrocity: Link

Return fire!

Identify the quote.

Read this:

What I think is missing is any clear Gospel proclamation on the part of the Pope. Of course he wants to increase the rapidly dwindling ranks of his own church, what leader would not want to do that? But is the building up of a church on the basis of hatred consistent with Jesus’ message? Is the idea “If you hate gay people and women, then come join us” one Benedict really wants to support? Or is this gesture likely to become, as I suspect, a tremendous embarrassment to present and future generations of Roman Catholics? Jesus Christ’s message about love and acceptance of all seems to have been somehow overlooked by the Holy Father.

Is this statement from:

A.) Your typical forum troll.
B.) “Some midnight madman with a saliva-bespattered keyboard venting into the comboxes.”
C.) “the considered opinions, purportedly, of a sitting bishop in a mainline Christian denomination”

Amazingly, the answer is C.

Hat tip to Diogenes with full entry here.

The Negative Witness to Truth Award goes to: Sir Ian McKellen!

Progressives will often let inconvenient truths slip out when they are too busy grandstanding to notice:

The story:

In a Q&A with Details magazine, the openly gay ‘Lord of the Rings’ star admits to a habit of tearing out the Bible passage that condemns homosexuality — Leviticus 18:22 — every time he finds one in his hotel room. The passage: “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.” “I’m not proudly defacing the book,” he asserts, “but it’s a choice between removing that page and throwing away the whole Bible.”

Get that? Sir Ian is tacitly admitting that the Bible does indeed condemn homosexual acts in the face of the endless parade of progressive theologians who twist themselves into pretzels insisting it doesn’t. Congratulations and thanks for the help Sir!