"Apple Polishing"

In response to a NYT article, August 28, Midwest Conservative Journal yesterday slapped around "the Saudi entity" attempting to polish its image in the West rather than making real changes in its society.

.... (1) Stay completely out of any upcoming September 11th observances. The role your countrymen played in the events of that day is burned into people's minds here. We also haven't forgotten that it took you almost a year even to admit it and that skepticism of the Saudi role that day still turns up from time to time in your press. And we know that you still allow the radical Islamic preachers who inspired 15 of the 19 mass murderers to preach their barbarism with impunity and you've made no attempt to rein them in. So any Saudi participation in this anniversary will be perceived as worse than an insult.

(2) That al-Jubeir guy speaks real good English and looks great in a suit. But an elegant liar is still a liar. Why not employ a woman as your foreign policy spokesperson? You can still get your opinions across and you might even convince a few people here that you actually do think women are more than baby-vending machines.

(3) Quit imprisoning and torturing Christians. That doesn't sit at all well over here. You might even want to let some Christian churches operate openly, if only for foreign workers. It would make your claims about Islamic tolerance of other religions ring a tiny bit less hollow.

P.S. Cool use of strikethrough on MCJ. If I take it up myself, you'll know whom to blame credit. :)

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Fri. 08/30/02 08:04:54 PM
Categorized as Classic.

"The War of the Rose"

Fr. Rob Johansen has been busy busy busy writing these past couple of days. He jumps again into the controversy over Michael Rose's book Goodbye, Good Men, in which Fr. Rob has been a major player. He reveals (well, I didn't know this, anyway) the truth behind one of Rose's ex-seminarian sources who accuses another seminarian of having propositioned him. As it turns out, the accused has been identified as a man who had had girlfriends, and even been engaged, before he pursued a vocation to the priesthood:

.... Rose’s case against the Louvain hinges on the testimony of Joseph Kellenyi, and his allegations of being subjected to the unwanted advances of a homosexual seminarian, whom, Kellenyi laments, was later ordained. Kellenyi does not name this person, designating him as "seminarian X". But Brian Saint-Paul discovered the identity of this seminarian: now-Father Pat Van Durme. Fr. Van Durme has come forward and made his outrage at Rose’s allegations known. Fr. Van Durme apparently not only never made advances on Kellenyi, he isn’t even homosexual. Not homosexual? That’s right, as several of his friends, ex-girlfriends, and Van Durme’s ex-fiancee have readily testified. That Rose could rely upon accusations of homosexual misconduct against a man whose heterosexual identity is well known and easily verifiable would be laughable, if the seriousness of the accusations did not rise to the level of calumny. But the patent falsity of Kellenyi’s charges demolishes the credibility of Rose’s attack....

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Fri. 08/30/02 10:34:38 AM
Categorized as Classic.

"The Nunc Dimittis of John Paul II"

By Ralph McInerny at Catholic Dossier.

A superb essay — what else? — by the editor of that unique and invaluable publication. Note how timely it is, though it was published in June 2001.

(Thanks Amy.)

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Fri. 08/30/02 10:26:43 AM
Categorized as Classic & Pope John Paul the Great.