Tired of being tired

Lately I have been relating much more to the psalms. I used to think they were full of bombastic, hyperbolic expressions of regret, hatred, intolerance, etc. For example, the psalmist always talks about being attacked by "enemies." I used to take that literally and thought, "Come on, it can't be that bad. Shouldn't you just forgive and forget?" But when I thought about it a little more expansively, that enemies weren't just your obvious opponents, but could be your own demons, real demons, and anything that hindered you from following God, I began relating to the psalmist's constant struggle.

I also began to understand why he needed God's help to defeat them because of his own weakness and inability. I relate to that completely now. No matter how hard I try, there are just some habits that I cannot shake. My enemies win every time I do whatever is I ought not to. So just like the psalmist, I lament my own weakness, the constant assault by my enemies, and plead to him for help and support, and even wonder why that help seems not to come or insufficient.

Part of it also is that as I have aged and grown in my faith, I have begun to see evil more prominently in my personal life and in the world. I think God only allows this as your faith grows because without faith and hope in God, the realization of such overwhelming evil could easily lead to despair. In fact, I fight against despair quite often, though I rarely feel outmatched by it, thank God.

This world is indeed one of many sorrows and suffering, one of constant challenge and failure. I envy those who seem either above it all, oblivious to it, or at peace with it, but also realize, as did the psalmist, that there is a constant battle going on, one that is both spiritual and material, and in fact the spiritual element is really the only element to worry about it. The material fights are mere derivatives of the spiritual war.

God save us, God help us, God have mercy on us and on those who reject, ignore, and defile you.

Climate fraud

I really can't believe the gall and cynicism of those who support anthropogenic global warming (AGW). The Climategate scandal was not some blip on the radar, or some minor quibbling about numbers. It exposed an all-out sabotage of the scientific method in order to silence AGW skeptics, or even honest doubters, and revealed some fundamental problems with the data on which much of the "established science" is based on, not the least of which is the fact that data used by the CRU to analyze the past and generate future models was LOST!

Then today I see on CNN some UK gov't science advisor criticizing the media for misinforming people about Climategate.... Wait, are you talking about the same media who refused to cover Climiategate initially, and who even when they did, didn't cover it with much detail? The same media who went right along with the pro-AGW crowd and uncritically accepted everything they were told??

It's like the Obama administration blaming the media for his dropping popularity. It's just preposterous.

Luckily, while I used to agonize over the one-sidedness of this debate and sincerely worried that the lack of coverage on Climategate would mean the continued ascendance of the pro-AGW agenda, it seems that facts, even when they are ignored or covered up, do end up winning the day.

AGW is now headed for the dustbin of history, where it will join overpopulation, global cooling, African killer bees, and cooties as just the latest attempt to impose some sort of global command and control mechanism in the name of saving us from ourselves.

No way out?

Just listened to a podcast from Catholic Answers about a woman (Dawn) who grew up in a gay household. She had some horrific experiences but was careful not to label all homosexual households as similarly unsuitable for children.

But in thinking about the issue of gay marriage, it seems to me that its legitimization is inevitable because the primary basis for opposing it is religious. To be sure, there are some very good philosophical arguments based on the concept of natural law, but they're simply not sufficient to overcome the plea from the GBLT community for equality under law. But in our society now, no law can be justified from a religious perspective. It's a false notion in my mind, but that's reality.

What gives me great pause with this issue is that Dawn, the lady I refer to above, says there is a lot of social science that backs her claim that homosexual households are in general very harmful for children. The problem is that if you try and make this argument, you will be immediately dismissed as a hate-monger, bigot, homophobe, etc. Also, even if the data do show a larger than normal negative trend, I have a feeling that that wouldn't be enough to stop states and countries from legalizing gay marriage.

One reason for this is our overwhelming desire to NOT persecute GLBT folks. That desire is so strong now we are bending over backwards (excuse the pun) to accommodate their demands regardless of how they might harm our larger society. We're not even taking the time to study the effects of things like gay marriage before jumping onto the pro-gay marriage bandwagon. We are also ignoring considerable scientific evidence of the dangers and harmful effects of the gay lifestyle while we being implementing pro-homosexual agendas in our schools (I love how liberals always deride conservatives for thinking there is a "homosexual agenda" when there most clearly is! Just check out our current Czar for school safety, a noted homosexual activist).

Also, the desire to NOT be called a bigot or homophone is so strong that people just stay quiet, leaving the arena free for the very loud, very active GLBT activists to impose their will on society at large.

Of course, the other driver here is our society's lack of concern for the welfare of children. Whether we talk about the prevalence of divorce, abortion, the difficulty of adoption, the acceptance of highly sexualized entertainment, etc., the overriding trend is to favor the pleasure and satisfaction of adults to the detriment of children. So in this case, I almost never hear the interests of the children being brought in the midst of debates on gay marriage.

Finally, homosexuals have a point when they say heterosexual marriage isn't some sort of paragon of morality. The high rates of divorce and the general denigration of marriage in our society has sort of brought low marriage as an institution. I've heard homosexuals say that as a result, how can we dare deny them this rather debased, culturally less-important institution when we let people like Britney Spears get married so frivolously? It's not a bad point, as much as I hate to admit it.

My main concern here is that large numbers of children raised in gay households will be harmed and their well-being sacrificed for the supposed good of allowing homosexuals to marry. But if this does happen, I am also sure that we won't be able to turn back. Yet another tragic situation for our children.