Pope John Paul II Takes Step Tword Sainthood

Tomorrow Pope John II will be "beatified" by the Roman Catholic church. Throngs of people will be headed into Vatican Square tomorrow. Of course first there is "veneration" and then "beatification" and then Sainthood. Beatification requires one Miracle, whereas Sainthood takes two miracles. Of course Pope John Paul II is considered much more of a humanitarian and in touch with the common man than the current Pope. In fact Benefict was referred to as kind of a protective attack dog, zealously guarding Catholic doctrine. Many thought Benedict would serve only a short while, when he has already served six years, with no signs of quitting. Of course people as diverse as Lek Vluenza, to Elizabeth Gayno to Steward Sutcliffe are affianados of Pope John Paul II. "OK quit mentioning people we never heard of" Stewart and Elizabeth are rather opposite in the way they deal with negative feelings. Stewart is inclined to speak his mind frankly whereas Elizabeth takes the Marge Simpson approach of "taking your bad feelings and stuffing them down into a deep, dark place". But Elizabeth is also a fan of Chuck Smith and Stu can't stand him. Really the whole idea of Sainthood seems silly. I was thinking about this whole topic lately. While we are generally forbidden to talk to the dead ("a message that never got through to You, obviously) we are encouraged to pray to the Saints. Perhaps in the realm of the dead, since Saints are elevated to the infallible status of God Himself, then it is fitting and proper to pray to them, since God has such a busy schedule and all. I have major problems envisioning much of a future for either British Royalty or the Papacy. In both cases maybe there will be a succession or two of a leader, but that will be it. British royal tradition is slowly but surely already starting to come unwraveled. In the case of the Church, there have been no progressive developments in Catholicism since they agreed to all the saying of the Mass in English in 1965. That's about the last time my own denomination updated their confessional creed. I told Craig today that Jews were hard to witness to because they in large part have a fundamental misunderstanding of the overall message of the Bible, which is God's sovreignty, God's perpouses being fulfilled without failure, and God as the redeemer of Mankind, who are destined to be made sinless. A Jew is a victim of his culture, which can be an oppressive taskmaster. Of course Stewart likes to talk about "The karma of the Jews". I don't want to go there because that's dog whistle speech for BAD karma. Stewart also has other Nazi like traits such as to at least a degree embracing the Nanny State, believing it's the government's obligation to insure the physical health and fitness of its citizens. Stu also doesn't believe the Catholics were being cowardly in not opposing the Nazis. He believes that Adolf Hitler "saw the goodness of the Church and had reverence for that and would never attack". My view is "Never say what Hitler would "never do" because if Hitler "has a bad day" he could do just about anything. Many people do not believe Pope John Paul II should be Sainted because "he presided over the period when child molestation among Priests was routinely being covered up". I have undecided feelings about this. I regard all Christians as pretty much cowards to begin with, and moral cowards in particular. I have no desire to make one or the other of them a Saint, which would only be added to the panorama of Icons to be idolized. Basically I agree with Signond Freud's statement that basically, we would all be psychologically healthier without religion. Stewart tells me he believes the same thing, but obviously he means something different by that than I do.

Well, the "Croakings of doom and gloom" as Anne Baxter would put it, continue on the Mc Laughlin report. I think I can see the future a little more clearly this week. I believe Donald Trump has become very close to "peaking" and he will indeed "peak" just about one month from now, and by the time he actually announces for President, his campaign will already be on a downward slope. I think Trump is self destructing in the long run. People got turned off to Ross Perot, too and his campaign peaked around the first of June in 1992. From then on it was a case of "bad timing" one after the other. First he quits and says something about the Bush family conspiracy. Then he jumps back in, after turning people off. In the case of Donald Trump I do think Trump "won the day" at least for last week. Anybody you get someone to do something that clarifies who they really are, I believe they have done a good thing or a "Mitzbah" as our Jewish brotherin might say. I just wish a few other entities would come out of the closet. I would love to see Trump run. Don't get me wrong. But what will happen (conspiracy theorist as I am) I believe Republican leaders will all gather in a cloister in a month or two and secretly decide that Tim Polente or Mitt Romney or somebody IS the candidate, and they will rig the table so that that candidate wins all the primary campaigns. People are pretty much lily livered followers and will back whoever the public opinion polls tell them to.

This whole gas crisis hysteria has about reached its limit. If you believed the Mc Laughlin group the world can't help but come to an end in the next few months. We're going to have a double dip recession for a couple dozen different reasons. Well, as the Zombie song says, in a few months "You Don't Need Any Reason" and that's because it will become obvious that gasoline prices and everything people were pinning their negative hopes on, will vanish. We know right now that they will collapse about forty percent, and could do most of that amazingly suddenly. I predict after Memorial Day people will be scratching their heads and say "I don't get it. Usually prices are headed up in the summer but the past week they have been collapsing. And all those fears of consumers not spending and unemployment rising and everything- - will evaporate along with that fall in prices. They said we should drill more. If we can, we should. My sources tell me that there is "nothing left to drill" that would not be more expensive than it was worth to extract. I'm telling you now if you hold oil futures you really ought to sell them now. As I said in a recent posting 'Bulls make money in the market, bears make money in the market, but hogs never do". Don't say you wern't warned.

I think I have come to terms with God in the past week or two. As I wrote I have pretty much "figured out that scientifically it's a "Just" cause and effect world" and you really can't ask for more than that. The Bible says "the curse without a cause does not come". That is a literal truth despite the fact you may not take kindly to the statement. It certainly does no good to "oppose" God because you'll only be beating against the air. I wish that more people were into Science and fewer were into Philosophy. Religion is like philosophy because neither demands any logical observational contact with the real world. I would rather one be a sociologist or anthropologist rather than a psychiatrist. Because in the first two they actually chart human behavior and learn from that. In the third occupation they forever state "what human behavior ought to be" and what is "normal" and what is not. In this they have an almost "religious" devotion to elevating themselves their fellow man, and frankly, engaging in unchristian thoughts and behavior. (Selah)