Monday, November 30, 2020

Notes: Tuesday, July 23, 2019-Monday, November 30, 2020 (part 1 of 2)

1. That Atheist straw man again: "Faith can require a conviction that defies evidence"

That quotation comes from the opinion piece "It's all a question of faith", by Dr. Andy Marks (at the time, "assistant vice-chancellor at Western Sydney University"), p. 21, The Daily Telegraph, Tuesday, September 17, 2019, published by Nationwide News, Surry Hills, N.S.W. (The article seems to be unavailable at that newspaper's website.) See also that article's last paragraph:
Conviction of belief might tell them otherwise, but the evidence can't be ignored.
["them" refers to those whom Dr. Marks perceives to be "The political defenders of re-ligion" (the last word spanned two lines in print, hence the dash)]
Labels: atheism

2. Some recent pronouncements by The Pope

2.1 Another of The Pope's near-annual calls for breastfeeding in church during Mass

See the text of "the impromptu homily the Holy Father pronounced after the reading of the Holy Gospel" during a New-Order Mass on the New-Order Feast of The Baptism of The Lord, Sunday, January 12, 2020, available in its original Italian here:


and in The Holy See Press Office Daily Bulletin item "Santa Messa nella Cappella Sistina con il rito del Battesimo dei Bambini, 12.01.2020" here:


and in English translation here:


and in The Holy See Press Office Daily Bulletin item "Holy Mass in the Sistine Chapel with rite of Baptism of babies, 12.01.2020" here:


(For independent confirmation, see the Crux news report "Baptizing babies, Pope Francis defends practice of infant baptism", by Elise Harris, dated January 12, 2020; according to the reporter, during that homily His Holiness was "telling parents not to be anxious if their child cries or whines, but to make them feel comfortable and to nurse them if needed":


Labels: breastfeeding, Francis Bergoglio, morals

2.2 The Pope against life imprisonment and the death penalty

See the last paragraph of the text of H.H. The Pope's Address, on Saturday, September 14, 2019, to the Penitentiary Police and staff of the Prison and Juvenile and Community Justice Administration, available in its original Italian here:


and in The Holy See Pres Office Daily Bulletin item "Udienza alla Polizia Penitenziaria, al Personale dell’Amministrazione Penitenziaria e della Giustizia minorile e di comunità, 14.09.2019" here:


and in English translation here:


and in The Holy See Press Office Daily Bulletin item "Audience with the Penitentiary Police and staff of the Prison and Juvenile and Community Justice Administration, 14.09.2019" here:


But that translation seems to downplay how emphatically His Holiness denounced life imprisonment; presumably "Life imprisonment is not the solution to problems - I repeat: life imprisonment is not the solution to problems, but a problem to be solved" translates "L’ergastolo non è la soluzione dei problemi - lo ripeto: l’ergastolo non è la soluzione dei problemi -, ma un problema da risolvere" more accurately than "Life imprisonment is not the solution to problems, but a problem to be solved" does. (The first translation is given in the Catholic News Agency news report "Pope Francis: Life imprisonment forgoes the ‘right to start over’", by Courtney Mares, dated September 16, 2019:


See also paragraphs 263-270 of The Pope's latest Encyclical Letter, Fratelli tutti, dated October 3, 2020:


Labels: death penalty, Francis Bergoglio, morals

3. "… Brian Tierney has shown that the idea of powers originating from God but coming through a body of people goes back at least to the thirteenth century and figures prominently in the conciliarism of Nicholas of Cusa, among others. See Tierney, Religion, Law, and the Growth of Constitutional Thought, 1150–1650 (Cambridge: CUP, 1982)."

That quotation, including its italics but with my ellipsis symbol, comes from note eighteen of "Resistance and Romans 13 in Samuel Rutherford's Lex, Rex", by Ryan McAnnally-Linz, in The Scottish Journal of Theology, Vol. 66, Issue 2, May 2013, pp. 140-158, available online (but with the body of the article behind a paywall) here:


Labels: Democratism, morals, politics

Reginaldvs Cantvar
St. Andrew's Day, A.D. 2020
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Monday, July 22, 2019

Notes: Tuesday, February 5-Monday, July 22, 2019 (part 3 of 3)

7. The latest bioethical offences from Australia's political duopoly

7.1 A Labor Federal Government would work to increase access to contraception and abortion, most notably by ensuring that "Commonwealth-State hospital funding agreements will expect that termination services will be provided consistently in public hospitals."

See the Media Release "LABOR’S PLAN TO SUPPORT WOMEN’S REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS", Wednesday, March 6, 2019, issued jointly by The Hon. Tanya Plibersek M.P. (at the time, Deputy Leader of H.M.A. Opposition and its Shadow Minister for Education and Training and for Women) and The Hon. Catherine King M.P. (at the time, Federal Shadow Minister for Health and Medicare) and available at their respective websites:

http://www.tanyaplibersek.com/media_release_labor_s_plan_to_support_women_s_reproductive_rights_wednesday_6_march_2019

https://www.catherineking.com.au/2019/03/05/labors-plan-to-support-womens-reproductive-rights/

Labels: A.L., abortion, contraception

7.2 "Women will have greater choice around IVF services with the NSW Liberals & Nationals Government providing up to a $500 rebate for pre-IVF fertility testing and greater access to lower cost treatments", whereby "the NSW Government will provide lower cost IVF treatments for around 6000 women through services at Royal Prince Alfred, The Royal Hospital for Women and Westmead hospitals"; and there will be "a partnership with UNSW for the first statewide fertility preservation service for young cancer patients at The Royal Hospital for Women."

Those quotations come from the press release "MAKING IVF MORE ACCESSIBLE FOR WOMEN", Saturday, March 9, 2019, downloaded from the website of The Liberal Party of Australia's New South Wales Division:

https://nsw.liberal.org.au/candidates/gladys-berejiklian/news/articles/MAKING-IVF-MORE-ACCESSIBLE-FOR-WOMEN

Labels: I.V.F., L.P.A., Nationals

8. St. Thomas Aquinas against the doctrines of original liberty and original equality

See note 92 at the end of the article "The Corporate Idea and the Body Politic in the Middle Ages", by Anton-Hermann Chroust, in The Review of Politics, Vol. 9, Issue No. 4, October 1947, pp. 423-452:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-politics/article/corporate-idea-and-the-body-politic-in-the-middle-ages/0B226F3CF3CB5272E74E7655C48EE5D2

This is the relevant section of that note:
Compare St. Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologica I, quaest. 96, art. 3 Google Scholar: “We must of necessity admit that in the primitive state there would have been some inequality.…” See ibid, quaest. 96, art. 4: “… a man is the master of a free subject, by directing him either towards his proper welfare, or the common good. Such a type of mastership would have existed in the state of innocence between man and man, for two reasons: first, because man is by nature a social being, and thus in the state of innocence he would have led a social life. Now a social life cannot exist among a number of people unless under the direction of one to look after the common welfare; for many, as such, seek many things, whereas one attends only to one.…” See also Summa contra Ceniiles[ sic] III, 81
[italics, bold type, and hyperlinks in the original, my square-bracketed interpolation]
Labels: Democratism, liberalism, morals, politics, St. Thomas Aquinas

9. Dr. Gosbell on ancient Christian (and pagan) attitudes to abortion and infanticide

See the A.B.C. Religion and Ethics article ""As long as it's healthy": What can we learn from early Christianity's resistance to infanticide and exposure?", by Dr. Louise Gosbell, Wednesday, March 13, 2019:

Warning: That article is headed by a picture which could scandalise some readers:

https://www.abc.net.au/religion/early-christianitys-resistance-to-infanticide-and-exposure/10898016

Labels: abortion, Fathers, infanticide, morals

10. 24% of mothers in couple families in Australia were unwaged in 2016, down from 32% in 1991.

My immediate source for the information in that headline is Figure 2 of the Australian Institute of Family Studies research summary "Fathers and work: A statistical overview", by Dr. Jennifer Baxter, May 2019:

https://aifs.gov.au/aifs-conference/fathers-and-work

(The ultimate source is the Australian Population Census customised reports, 1991–2016, according to Figure 2's caption.)

Labels: demography, family, social trends, work

11. On the morning of the 26. ult., The Duke of Cambridge "officially opened the Albert Kennedy Trust new Services Centre" in London.

See the Court Circular of that date. According to akt's "our history" webpage, akt is the "world’s first ever service for homeless LGBT youth":

https://www.akt.org.uk/our-history

and according to its "duke of cambridge visits akt" webpage, that official opening involved "the first visit to a lgbtq+ youth charity by a member of the royal family":

https://www.akt.org.uk/news/duke-of-cambridge-visits-akt

Labels: G.L.B.T., William Cambridge

Reginaldvs Cantvar
Feast of St. Mary Magdalene, Penitent, A.D. 2019
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