Tag Archives: Suicide bomber

2022-09-17 · 5:15 am

Buckeyes & grasshoppers, not what you think: anamnesis of Eden, but first the Holy Sacrifice

This Common Buckeye on the tarmac driveway next to the tomatoes calls to mind Tomato Buckeye Rot. The similarity of the markings is striking.

Imagine that your visual defense against predators is to look like a rotten tomato.

If you’re all nerdy about chemistry amidst a symbiotic ecosystem, the Common Buckeye in its various morphologies opens up a universe of bio-manipulation and applications (see Genesis 1:28). Nature is not ever what we think; there is always so very much more.

Creation speaks of God the Creator. In such times as this (see Romans chapter 1, beginning to end, no, really, go read chapter 1 of Romans now!) it is good to notice the beauty of God’s Creation and be pointed to God, thanking God, praising God.

Meanwhile, at the same time, this grasshopper was on the floor of the open carport. I mean, those eyes…

Anyway, over at Wikipedia we read about what fallen human nature has to be busy about, even with grasshoppers:

  • “In February 2020, researchers from Washington University in St. Louis announced they had engineered “cyborg grasshoppers” capable of accurately detecting explosives. In the project, funded by the US Office of Naval Research, researchers fitted grasshoppers with lightweight sensor backpacks that recorded and transmitted the electrical activity of their antennal lobes to a computer. According to the researchers, the grasshoppers were able to detect the location of the highest concentration of explosives. The researchers also tested the effect of combining sensorial information from several grasshoppers on detection accuracy. The neural activity from seven grasshoppers yielded an average detection accuracy rate of 80%, whereas a single grasshopper yielded a 60% rate.”

So, probably you don’t need to have a helicopter drop a thousand detection-grasshoppers onto this kid. You already know there’s something suspicious when he’s dressed for the arctic in a cover-the-bombs-parka when it’s a hot day. By the way, this 14 year old was successfully stripped of his bombs.

Anyway, this kind of research will surely save lives. Who would’ve thought? Grasshoppers!

There’s always more to learn. Fascinating. Thanks be to God. Love of God makes the thanksgiving exhilerating.

I call to mind the double anamnesis speech of Cardinal Ratzinger to the USCCB in Dallas, TX, in 1991. This is one his most important contributions, right up there with Ad tuendam fidem and then, as Benedict XVI, Summorum Pontificum.

Too bad the bishops didn’t understand a word of what he said, which means that they were already more involved in the second half of chapter one of Romans than the first half of that first chapter. And so we have what we have today.

Basically, you can’t have a remembrance of the pristineness of the Garden of Eden without first of all having a remembrance brought to one’s own living testimony (anamnesis, from which we have the word martyr) of the Last Supper united with Calvary, we being united in solidarity with the wounds of Jesus.

This is essential reading for today: https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/conscience-and-truth-2468

It’s good to be solidly grounded in the joy of learning ever so much more about our relationship with our good God in these times of the denial of natural law, divine law, in these times of the denial of Jesus.

You know you’re getting somewhere when the Holy Ghost has you say, “Abba! Father!” through, with and in Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, looking forward to the new Eden, the new paradise, the new “garden” of the new heavens and the new earth in heaven.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me, a wretched sinner who crucified you, and please have mercy on the whole world. You founded your mercy on your justice. Thank you.

Oh. And imagine being hidden with Christ in God, your camouflage being the carrying about the death of Christ within us, you know, as the Master, so the disciple. I think of Saint Paul:

  • “From henceforth let no man be troublesome to me; for I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus in my body” (Galatians 6:17).
  • “But Father George! Father George! You don’t understand! Being close to Jesus in this world isn’t to be hidden at all. You stand out as the exception, not with the majority, what Karine Jean-Pierre says makes you an extremist!”

Yes, well. This is how it works: the closer you are to Jesus the more the world doesn’t understand your identity in Jesus, who said that the world will hate us as much as it hates Him. Who we truly are is invisible to the world just as the identity of Jesus as the Son of the Living God was not recognized by the world. Proportional to our ‘in your face’ proclamation, the more hidden with Christ in God we are.

17 Comments

Filed under Nature

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

2020-09-12 · 7:39 am

“I’m Christian, so I don’t carry a gun,” he said, thus claiming I’m not Christian.

Saeed Hotari, terrorist suicide bomber

“I’m Christian, so I don’t carry a gun,” said some guy to me the other day – knowing I’m a priest and a law enforcement chaplain – thus claiming that I’m not a Christian because I do carry, thus claiming that all law-enforcement officers are also anti-Christian because they also carry.

If that guy’s house was being burned by mobs, and his family was getting raped and looted and killed, you know, because he himself is part of the he establishment, living in society as he does, I just bet he thinks he could stand idly by, watching all this in all safety, maybe filming it while trying to also call 911, waiting for law enforcement to arrive after minutes if not hours – depending on the day – arriving after his house was torched, after his family was raped and killed and after the mob had moved on to other neighbors’ houses to do the same. I bet he would call those “anti-Christian” police who also carry weapons. And when they arrived and stopped the criminals, I bet he would stop claiming law enforcement officers and any supporting chaplains are anti-Christian, having risked their lives to save the likes of him and his neighbors if not in time to save his family. No greater love and all that… He should sign up for some 2nd amendment instruction.

I’m guessing that he just doesn’t have the experiences I have. For instance, I knew Saeed Hotari pictured at the top of this post. I would consider him a friend ten years before he did what he did. But if I saw him walking into the Dophinarium strapped up with bombs likely weighing more than himself and screaming all Jews must die and shrieking that “Allah is great!”, I would neutralize the threat and be happy that I did, even while I was sad about the fallen state of the world in which something like that terrorist attack could be planned and put into action.

Here’s a list of Saeed’s victims who died. Add to that another more than 130 with horrific injuries, missing arms and legs, suffering hematomas and shattered skeletons. Perhaps that young man could recite their names, as the practice goes, along with their ages and where they’re from, asking himself what he would do if he was able to take out the threat. Would he stand idly be when there were only seconds to stop him? Would he call the IDF who might get there in time to put up police tape around the area? If he had a tool to stop the threat would he use it? Scary questions, for him, I’m sure.

  • Maria Tagiltseva, 14, of Netanya
  • Raisa Nimrovsky, 15, of Netanya
  • Ana Kazachkova, 15, of Holon
  • Katherine Kastaniyada-Talkir, 15, of Ramat Gan
  • Irina Nepomnyashchi, 16, of Bat Yam
  • Mariana Medvedenko, 16, of Tel Aviv
  • Yulia Nelimov, 16, of Tel Aviv
  • Liana Saakyan, 16, of Ramat Gan
  • Marina Berkovizki, 17, of Tel Aviv
  • Simona Rodin, 18, of Holon
  • Aleksei Lupalu, 16, of Ukraine
  • Yelena Nelimov, 18, of Tel Aviv
  • Irena Usdachi, 18, of Holon
  • Ilya Gutman, 19, of Bat Yam
  • Roman Dezanshvili, 21, of Bat Yam
  • Pvt. Diez (Dani) Normanov, 21, of Tel Aviv
  • Ori Shahar, 32, of Ramat Gan
  • Yael-Yulia Sklianik, 15, of Holon – died of her injuries on 2 June 2001
  • Sergei Panchenko, 20, Ukraine – died of his injuries on 2 June 2001
  • Jan Bloom, 25, of Ramat Gan – died of his injuries on 3 June 2001
  • Yevgeniya Dorfman, 15, of Bat Yam – died of her injuries on 19 June 2001

“Father George, you don’t understand what with your putting up straw men examples like that, because that was in Israel where it’s just that ‘someone did something’ (Ilhan Omar), like it was, you know, an ‘incident’ (Nancy Pelosi) and ‘what does it matter anyway?’ (Hillary Clinton). We’re all nice here in America.”

I could multiply examples of myself getting shot at, but let’s limit this to just this area is just the last few days right here in this area:

  • So, just the other day, not far as the crow flies, down in north Georgia, a deputy pulled over a truck and trailer. The guy immediately shot the deputy in the chest (who survived). They caught the perp and his accomplice and also found out that the perp was hauling illegal explosives, heading south on 75, which would be in the direction of Atlanta, you know, in time for the elections. Get it?
  • So, just the other day, now in Western North Carolina, a deputy pulled over a guy who immediately got out of his vehicle and shot the officer in the face (who later died).
  • Oh, and just the other day, about all the law enforcement in the region was doing an massive operation just down the road, no, really, like pretty much all available law enforcement in the region. Because we’re all nice.

I could continue, but, for my interlocutor pacifist, there’s really nothing I can say. If defense of the innocent from unjust aggression is a mortal sin of the magnitude that I can no longer be a Christian, what can I say?

Where do these people get this? Oh, I forgot. There’s a minister in the region who is aggressively promoting BLM, which stands for “Destroy the Police.”

We live in weird times. Even Jesus is mocked and killed:

1 Comment

Filed under Guns, Law enforcement, Officer Down!, Terrorism

Tagged as , , , , , , ,