Friday, August 12, 2011

Quick Takes! School, shameless popery, and barbarians


Here we go with some randomness for the week!



1. Back to school time around here. My oldest just went back to college for her junior year, and in just a few days we are taking our second child to college for his freshman year! Three kids started back at their middle school/high school this week, and in a week or so I have two little redheads going to first grade and kindergarten! That will leave just me and the one-year-old at home -- the one whom I sometimes call Benevolent Destruction.

2. Perhaps during Benevolent Destruction's ever-shortening nap time I will be able to complete and polish the dozens of half-written blog posts that have been left to stagnate in my drafts file. Or I could do the five thousand and one things around the house that could not be done when ten bodies occupied the house, all day, all night, all summer long. Or, maybe I will just take a nap when Benevolent Destruction does.

3. I so appreciated the comments on my book recommendation post, because they made me realize that I should have made a huge disclaimer before I wrote it. Mine is not an exhaustive list, nor even a short list of essential Catholic classics. I didn't want to recommend anything that I haven't yet read (now there's a long list!). My little list consists only of those books that I find myself referencing often, or that I have read, loved, and remembered for years thereafter. However, I am thrilled that Brandon Vogt offered his much more complete list of the Best Catholic Books of All Time. Unfortunately, at the rate I'm going, I'll be dead before I get through the first couple of sections. Sigh. Well, I'll read them in Heaven. Assuming I make it to Heaven. But then again, if I do make it to Heaven, then I won't need or want to read the books anymore. Ah, the irony!

4. Found a blog I love, and it covers many of the same themes that we do here at the Bubble, but with so much more depth. If you haven't had a chance to check out Joe's amazingness at Shameless Popery, please do that now. The Bubble will never grow up and become sophisticated, but if it did, it would want to be Joe's blog for sure!

5. Ummm, so I'm sorry if this offends any of our friends on the Left, but the following two articles really said all I want to say about the barbarians who have been rioting, looting, burning, and terrorizing London.


The British writer describes the mobs this way:
[A] large, amoral, brutalised sub-culture of young British people who lack education because they have no will to learn, and skills which might make them employable. They are too idle to accept work waitressing or doing domestic labour, which is why almost all such jobs are filled by immigrants. They have no code of values to dissuade them from behaving anti-socially or, indeed, criminally, and small chance of being punished if they do so. They have no sense of responsibility for themselves, far less towards others, and look to no future beyond the next meal, sexual encounter or TV football game. They are an absolute deadweight upon society, because they contribute nothing yet cost the taxpayer billions. Liberal opinion holds they are victims….
Read the whole sickening thing, here.

Ann Coulter's take on the (majority white) barbarians includes some interesting specifics on the dehumanizing disaster that is the British welfare state:


It ain't pretty.

And, it's an odd association I know, but I keep thinking that "Mrs. Duggar's kids would not be involved in this type of thuggery!"

6. Speaking of barbarians, there have been more bombings of Catholic churches in the Middle East, including this one in Iraq. Please never forget to pray for our Arab brothers and sisters in Christ who are under siege and live in constant fear. And for me it's personal, as these are my people.

But since we are speaking of Catholic churches, I won't leave it on an ugly note. Please look at these amazing photos of an underground salt church in a salt mine in Poland! Even the chandeliers are made of salt! I love my bubble of faithful Catholics no matter where they are. Best people in the world. (I almost said "salt of the earth!" heh heh heh)

7. Finally, I watched the Republican Presidential Debate last night. I liked some candidates a lot more than some others, but I am left with one overwhelming feeling: Anybody but Obama.

2012 simply cannot come fast enough.


Thanks to Jen, for hosting!









31 comments:

  1. On the topic of rioters and civility, this article is great in highlighting what it means to be part of civilization. Sometimes it's standing shoulder to shoulder with your neighbors to defend yourselves and your livelihood against such rioters.
    http://darwincatholic.blogspot.com/2011/08/side-of-civilization.html

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  2. Also, it's important to note that rioters are not practicing civil disobedience. Civil disobedience is a political action that we should be proud to participate in if we feel the situation demands it. Rioting and looting are just criminal behavior with a shoddy veneer of political activism.

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  3. I love the Duggars. Every time I catch an episode of their show, I just come to respect them even more. Their way of life may not be for everyone, but they fact that they are raising NINETEEN holy, polite, patient, compassionate, etc children is just astounding.

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  4. I agree--good-bye Obama!!
    By the way, I liked your list of books! I love to read book reviews because I'm too lazy to try to read a little of the book or the back of the book to see what it's like. (For me, it's all about how it's written, not so much what it's about.) I usually just pick up the book and look at the cover and say, "Eh...nah." And put it back.
    Yes, I judge a book by its cover.

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  5. Sorry, one more thing!
    School starts already for you?! Wow, you guys start early! It's still summer over here! I just assumed all schools started at the same time. More or less, anyway.

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  6. Leila,

    Wow, thanks so much!

    By the way, I loved the post before this ("Guess Who's in your neighborhood?"). I actually posted it to Google Plus last night, about two hours before this post. So the admiration is certainly mutual. God bless,

    Joe

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  7. I so wish I had redheads. I'm a strawberry blonde and I can't seem to get any redheads. Tessa and Charlotte have a red hue to their hair, but I doubt it'll be noticeable once they're bigger. How do you pay for all the kids being in school?! It's one thing I'm nervous about but I try to remind myself that God will provide.

    Oh my gosh, I just read that Ann Coulter article last night. She cracks me up, but that story was just crazy. It's amazing what happens when you spoon feed entire generations. When will liberals "get it"????

    Also, a liberal friend of mine is always dogging on the Duggars and I just don't get it. What exactly is the problem? They homeschool, they're not in debt, their kids are amazing, and the list goes one. It makes me sick when people rip into them because they have so many kids. I, myself am told on a regular basis that I "can't" or "shouldn't" have more kids and it's disgusting. Last I checked this was my marriage, and unless you're my husband, God, or my doctor, it's non of your business how many kids I have. It just irks me to no end to see good people like the Duggars poked at all the time purely because they live a different lifestyle than the disgusting society we live in now.

    Anybody but Obama is right. I haven't watched the debates yet because once I go into political mode I cannot dig myself out. I go totally insane and start over researching every single thing about every single candidate and I can't put myself into that mode right now. I go overboard. But I'm already planning my election night party in my head. We had one in 2008, but it didn't exactly end on a good note. lol. This one better!!

    I'll stop rambling now ;)

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  8. "for me it's personal, as these are my people." So important -and thanks for the reminder- that there are good people suffering while we complain about waking up on Sunday for church!

    And as for those salt mines in Poland, I had the privelege to visit them a few years back and they are even more impressive in person - and you can lick the walls :) We sang some amazing Latin hymns down in the full sized chapel - and let me tell you - the acoustics were spectacular!

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  9. Monica and Liesl, great points and I agree!

    Christine, that is so cool! You know what is really funny? My parents called me this morning and told me they have bee there, too! They even have a rosary made out of salt! How did I not know this? ha ha!

    Kara, I love your ramblings! Keep it up! And I don't get the animus towards the Duggars, either. Seems weird to me and I'm not sure what's behind it. Well, I am, but that would be a whole other blog post, ha ha!

    Well, our three kids in the charter school go for free (it's a public charter school, but a classical curriculum, thank goodness). My two little ones get help with tuition through the state's (miraculous) tuition tax credit program. Any taxpayer in AZ can redirect their state tax dollars to a school or child of their designation to help with tuition! It's amazing, and of course the Dems and libs want to kill the program, but so far they have had no luck.

    My college kids: Scholarships and loans, ugh. Tuition just keeps going higher (20% hike this year alone, for a state school!), which is beyond nuts. The whole college paradigm has to change.

    Becky, I know! It's early here! In my day, we didn't go back to school till after Labor Day. Things have changed and I don't know why.

    Joe, what an honor!!! Thank you and keep up the amazing work!!

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  10. I don't know how you do, I am just caring for 3 boys (15, 13, and 7 mo) and I am wiped out. I've been meaning to email you but time is so elusive. So happy I got to read your blog today!

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  11. Adios Obama! I watched last night too, and thought the same thing.....

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  12. My oldest gets the CTODP scholarship but we can't seem to find much else to help. We have 2 years before the next one goes to school so I've been researching my butt off but haven't quite figured it out yet.

    You totally should blog about the Duggars. I'd have lots to say on that topic I'm sure lol.

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  13. LOVE the Duggars. How can you not? And your schools must have A/C. Of course they do, it's like always hot there, right?! Ours don't so we start later. Or at least I think that's why we start later. Either way, I'm glad :)

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  14. When Benevolent Destruction naps, you nap too. Sleep is important; the rest can wait! :)

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  15. That article was alarming! I can see us going down that road soon...but our police don't really mess around here in the States.

    The Duggars are awesome! They inspire me to trust that God always provides when we place our faith in Him.

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  16. I am in total agreement with you about the schocking (sad) riots and please, this Canadian is begging my American neighbours, vote Obama out of the whitehouse!!!!!
    signed
    THeresaEH in Alberta

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  17. Oh my goodness. This stuff that is happening in Britain sounds so eerily familiar. The silence of society, standing by idly, doing nothing, while good people get hurt.

    Out of all that was said in your post today, I took that home. I suppose this is why I like to live in my own little bubble.

    Blessings.

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  18. I sometimes wonder how many of America's teens would react under the same circumstances, since the same deficit of values and morals runs rampant here too.

    Couldn't agree with you more about 2012.

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  19. Don't let the door hit him on the way out.

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  20. In reference to the riots in London, just take a look at the State Fair riots in Milwaukee. I never would have even known about them if my sister from Chicago wasn't here visiting. Guess they have been having these problems in Chicago as well and have started a 8:30 curfew for 12 and under and another curfew for 12 and up...there goes more freedom.

    Leila, every so often it strikes me that we live such similar lives. I also have a child returning as a junior to college and one starting as a freshman in college, then it's one in high school, one in middle school, two in elementary and one at home!

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  21. Jan, that is so cool!! Parallel lives, ha ha!

    And, I only heard about the riots in Wisconsin from Drudge Report. It is very scary.

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  22. Hi, I've posted once before on your blog as you turned up in a Catholicism search I did ( after our son was accepted at Catholic High School) and I have kept on reading as I find your views very thought provoking.

    I should say that I am from the UK, and I live in a city a hundred miles away from London, and last week was scarey and actually totally bewildering for most of the UK population. I was watching it on the television screen and it felt like I was watching a movie or worse, the kind of computer game I ban my kids from playing!

    I thought the article you linked to was rather extreme, and I wondered if the writer has ever visited Britain? But on the other hand I don't agree with the left wing argument over here that this was all the result of our current government's spending cuts ( we're only just starting to feel the effects of them.)

    But there clearly is a whole lot of young people here who lack a feeling of belonging, and who sadly don't seem to have a sense of right or wrong. I read an article in The Economist this weekend that thinks it was a peculiar English pheonmenon because we have high levels of inequality in our society ( the article said " American levels!") plus a lax Euorpean attitude to criminal justice....I don't know but it certainly is worrying.

    However I do have a "funny" concerning this, I should say that although I knew who the Duggars were, I had never seen their show....last week whilest the riots were on, I had an overwhelming urge to find them, so following a youtube search, I have now been enjoying their very wholesome tv series....so maybe the Duggars would be the answer to the moral malaise that our country is suffering from!!!!!

    And finally thank you for the links to the Polish salt mines, my middle son went on a school trip to Poland three years ago and he kept telling me how beautiful they were and how sorry he was he had no pictures of them to share......I have now seen them, and he is right they are amazing.

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  23. Sue, hello! I am so happy you are reading and commenting! We need a British perspective! :)

    The first writer that I quoted above (and linked) is Max Hastings and he is a British writer writing for a British news outlet. The second writer is Ann Coulter, who is American, but is (I would guess) very well traveled. She is definitely a satirical, over the top writer, but I find that her facts are always dead on. I am interested in more of your thoughts and that of your fellow Brits!

    I have been to London (loved it) years ago, and my parents travel there frequently. My mom reads a lot of British news, and when she (or Drudge Report) link me to things like The Daily Mail online, etc, there are often human interest stories. The think that has dismayed me for several years is the predictability that no matter the story, it seems that the parents are unmarried (always a discussion of "Jane and her partner John and their child), or that teens are raising second and third generation out of wedlock kids. Don't get me wrong…. I realize we have a HUGE problem here in the USA, too. But it seems you guys might be a little bit ahead of us in the secularization of your nation, and the devaluing (or lack of necessity) of marriage in general. Also, it doesn't seem to break along racial lines there. (Single moms here among white folks are certainly "trying" to catch up with the number of black single moms, but the African-American community still has the more catastrophic numbers.)

    Tell me I am wrong and I will be thrilled!!! I want to know that the British people do value marriage and traditional family and God and virtue. I am hoping that is true and that the reports I see are greatly exaggerated.

    I would love your take, also, on the idea of the "inequality" in Britain. I read somewhere that the immigrants take the jobs that native British won't take, and that the list of open apprenticeship opportunities number in the thousands, but that folks don't want to take them, but prefer to live off the government.

    I love that you found the Duggars!! :) :) Yes, following their example of family, love of God and virtue could help us all!

    Your son is so blessed to have gone to the salt mine church! Wow!!

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  24. Hi Leila,

    I hope that some more British people come and comment as I don't consider myself very politically aware, but I'll do my best to discuss some of your points further.

    I should also say that if you know the UK at all I live in a rather out on the limb part of it ( Norwich the capital city of Norfolk county) and that we are probably slightly insulated from the goings on in London and the North/Midlands where most of the trouble was.

    I guess I'm slightly wary of the Daily Mail as a news source as they major in single parent on benefit depressing stories and love to sensationalise....I like The Times or The Telegraph myself and if you want to understand our left wing liberal media you have to read The Guardian.

    But yes we do have large numbers of single parents, one of the highest rates in Euorpe I think, and we don't have the racial split you describe.

    The thing is I think that if you ask most British people they'd say that marriage is the ideal, but they don't necessarily feel the need to join in with that ideal....it's perplexing!

    I also think that you are right that our society is much more secular than yours. I cannot, for example, imagine a Duggar family here. And maybe that's the nub of the problem, we started out as a Christian country and somehow we've lost our purpose?....

    Sadly you are right about immigrants taking the poorly paid jobs that British people won't do. I suspect that is a negative result of our welfare system. If you are better off on benefits, many people will prefer to stay on them...I know people who do this, I suspect most people in the UK do.

    Apprenticeships are in my experience slightly different, the government has set up new apprenticeship schemes and there aren't enough to go round.

    So I probably agree with you more than I wanted to LOL, perhaps you should come to the UK soon and look for yourself???

    Yes my middle son was very lucky to get to see the salt mine church ( he also went to Auschwitz which was unforgettable.) Just chatting to my son about it, and he says forget coming to the UK, go to Poland!

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  25. Sue, fascinating! I love your thoughts. And this nails it:

    And maybe that's the nub of the problem, we started out as a Christian country and somehow we've lost our purpose?….

    Yes, yes! It's exactly as Pope Benedict has lamented. Europe has lost and forgotten its Christian roots, and this is a grave thing, indeed.

    I hope to write more soon. But how interesting that you mentioned Auschwitz on this very day. Today is the 70th anniversary of the martyrdom of St. Maximilian Kolbe, who died in Auschwitz. He is one of the greatest saints of the last century (my kids' school is named for him), and you can read a short post about his heroic sacrifice, here:

    http://www.catholicvote.org/discuss/index.php?p=19792

    Truly amazing.

    Hope to be back soon...

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  26. Buh bye Obama! You are right 2012 CAN'T come fast enough!

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  27. I guess the important question to ask is why they are they burning London? Is there one holier than thou and apathetic church or do we still possess a Holy and Apostolic Church which would step in and make a difference in hopeless situations? One that goes out of its way in self denial, so that one group doesn't loose hope in itself at the expense of another. A United Church that stands not a divided one that fails.

    We have an American saying "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" and another "It is easier to stay out than to get out".

    Sure, these thugs are acting barbaric, its inexcusable... but is it preventable? How many hurtles and fences and elitism measures are in place to keep one group out and the other in? If you going to dump all the sewage in the creek, don't complain later when you can't drink the water.

    I see the right doing things that are immoral too, Texas for instance, requires* everyone in the state to donate to the "dollar more" plan which is supposed to help those who cant afford the cooling bill in the summer. Instead of ALL the money going to help out, only a percentage is going to it now. The state keeps the rest, billions of dollars that are supposed to go to help out the elderly on fixed incomes. So elderly people are turning off their AC because they cant afford it and are dying in the heat. The same state, because of deficit issues severely cut funding to social medical programs while leaving in place tax breaks for oil companies since they don't want to discourage 'free' enterprise. Could the cities of Texas be next?

    I would love to see Christ depicted with a right slant on morals... Sir should we stone this adulterer? Yes. I see plenty here to accuse her. Master, there is only five loaves and a few fish. Good, we shall eat. Send the lazy crowds out to get a job. This is my body and my blood, which shall be given to no one making less than 2 million a year.

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  28. Anonymous you sound like Dr. Strangelove, am I right?

    The looters are all teens and young twenties. Mostly teens. They have a lot of government benefits (did you read the articles)?

    If you go back and read the articles, or any of the information coming out of London, you will see that it was the very generous, no accountability British welfare system which gives us teens who think it's funny to use their Blackberries to coordinate lootings with their friends. They are bored, and the two girls interviewed by the BBC said it was "fun", as they giggled.

    Dig a little deeper. Imagine, just imagine, that sometimes a government welfare state can can establish and perpetuate conditions which rob human beings of their dignity.

    Read the articles.

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  29. PS: Mrs. Ives knows the scoop:

    http://www.catholicvote.org/discuss/index.php?p=19851

    God bless her for doing the right thing.

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  30. Some more good reading for "anonymous", which includes a great Chesterton quote about men who turn to evil:

    http://catholicexchange.com/2011/08/16/157621/

    The author ends the piece:

    One thing can be certain, and must be said; no social conditions, no poverty, no failures of government can excuse such bestiality, theft and ruin and bloodshed. I have heard commentators try to work up sympathy for the rioters by saying that it is because of this government policy or that social inequality that the rioters are rioting. If they were really starving, there might be some excuse for them to steal food, but not to set fire to homes. They are guilty of foul, brutal inhumanity—no less guilty because they may have had some reason to be unhappy.

    In the end, the word used by the Englishman to describe the French Reign of Terror is the only word to describe the English riots: “Damnable.” They are doing it, quite literally, for the hell of it. If they are not stopped, if sanity and common sense do not rein them in, then it may happen that they will remake Britain in their own image, and it will become—like France in the Revolution—a living hell.

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