Not Classy

Yes, the title of this post is intended to be a pun.  

What was this guy thinking?

No virtue, especially no temperance.  Poor judgment.  Anything to get a little porn in the classroom.  And what about the black mail here?  $150 for extra credit?  What’s up with that?

For the record, LaSalle University is not on the Newman Guide for Catholic colleges that are faithful to a Catholic identity and faithful to the Magisterium.

TrueMan up!

Couldn’t Disagree More

In this video, Ted Haggard spouts off about forgiveness and restoration.  Haggard, an ex-evangelical preacher, you may recall, was caught up in a web of lies when his gay male prostitute “mistress”, also a meth addict, outed him and exposed him to not only his wife and children, but to his congregation (New Life Church in Colorado Springs – a non-denominational mega church) and the world.  Haggard was destroyed in the tabloids, the news, the reports, on the web and especially in Christian circles.  He was a fraud and led many astray because of his actions.

When Haggard speaks of restoration, he speaks as though he deserves it.  Although he can be forgiven, his attitude doesn’t seem (at least not to me) to be in the right place and it doesn’t seem that he wants to take any responsibility.  I’ve seen him in other videos and have always felt the same about those interviews.  He seems to place a lot of blame and like he doesn’t want to accept his consequences.  Not very manly, if you ask me.  “…Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

I couldn’t disagree more with what he says in this video.  He speaks of “the church”, as most Protestants do, as the group of people who believe in Christ.  As Catholics, we speak of “The Church” in a different way and I think that, as She always has, The Church does a great job of restoring people.  It’s frustrating to see a video like this because this ex-pastor, who still has influence on people and can give them reasons not to believe, feels like he can say whatever he wants with complete disregard for who hears it or who he affects.

Watch it and see what you think.  Leave me comments.

TrueMan up!

Let God Do It

Recently, I’ve been thinking about my life and how God has blessed me.  I think about it all the time, really.  I constantly pray in thanksgiving, for my life has been very abundant and gets better as every day comes and goes.  When I look at my family, my children and wife especially, my occupation, my friends, my stuff, my home, my ministry, my faith… I realize that I am a blessed man.  God certainly remains faithful.  I think about all of this in the context of time and relate it to others that I know that struggle with letting it all happen in God’s time.  Whether it be a job situation, a financial situation, a relationship, having children, whatever the case may be, many people desire to control the situation and try to do it all their own.  My advice… Let God do it!

Take a look at my life, for example, and see how (in only a short period of time) my entire life has come together.

10 years ago, I was a two-faced 19 year old boy, living one life in public and one life in private.  I was an evangelical Protestant at the time, who hated Catholicism and most Catholics.  I was merely a college jock, a rage-aholic, a porn addict, a womanizer, angry-as-all-get-out and lost in my own selfishness and pride.  School didn’t matter to me, I was lazy (a sloth, really) and concerned with very little in the world.  I didn’t have a serious girlfriend (who would’ve wanted to date me?!), and if I was seeing anyone, it was almost always about getting some sort of physical pleasure from them.   Never to be a self-sacrificing gift of self.  Never to be a leader. Never about being a TrueMan.

8 years ago, I had a profound conversion.  I experienced Christ in the Eucharist and desired wholeheartedly to be part of His Church, the Holy Roman Catholic Church.  I was over my rage issue, was dealing with my porn addiction, wasn’t two faced anymore for “my yes meant yes and my no meant no” and many other blessings were coming around.  I was still single, but that was okay.  It wasn’t the right time yet.

6 years ago I was working as a Catholic missionary with FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students).  I made very little money, about 2/3 below the poverty line!, but it didn’t matter to me.  I was changing lives.  Then, it happened.  I met Catherine.  From then until now, a very short period of time, my life has gone into hyper-drive.  God has brought me every blessing I could imagine and I am so grateful for it.  Catherine and I started dating.  We had very little.  We took it a day at a time and now, 3 children, a mortgage, a thriving website, a career of my dreams and a solid marriage later, here we are, blessed abundantly.  We’ve been married 4.5 years.  It didn’t take long.  God blesses in His time, in His way, through His plan.  Not mine.  My plan stunk. My time was rubbish.  My way was wrong.  Only in Him will we find our joy.

Why do I share this?  To toot my horn at you?  No.  To show you that God has great things planned for you?  Yes.  To suggest that you step back from control and worry?  Yes.  To say, “I’ve been there.  I’ve been down in that ditch.  I’ve been wallowing in my own filth and that’s not the place for you!”  Yes!

Look, 10 years ago when I had a horrible life, was angry and with only a few friends, I had little hope for life.  I was in a place of despair.  I was to the point where I figured no woman would ever want me.  That meant I wouldn’t have kids.  That meant that I wouldn’t fulfill my dream of being a dad.  I didn’t think my career would mean much because I had no drive.  Overall, I figured God had given up on me.  In reality, though, I had given up and put God on the back burner.  No, actually, I had put God down in the crevice between the cabinet and the side of the oven where all the crumbs, dust and grease are.  I tried to do it all on my own. I thought that was being self-sufficient.  I thought that doing it on my own was manliness.  I thought that dominating a young woman meant being manly and leading.  Once I let Go, I saw more clearly.  (Let Go and Let God.)  I let God work, I let God bless, I let God love.  I accepted it.  I welcomed it.  I was ready for it.  God’s time was the right time.

Will your life play out like this?  No, not necessarily.  Your life will play out the way God wants it to play out… if you let Him work in you.  He’ll be there, regardless of what you decide.  But take it from me, surrendering your life to Him now makes a whole lot more sense than living the way I was.  Give up the control, the self-sufficiency (in the context I used it above) and seek Him.  Let God do it!

TrueMan up!

Archbishop Promotes Fight Against Porn

Great work, Archbishop Naumann!  This is my favorite quote, from a great Shepherd!  “We fail our people if we’re not courageous in preaching about chastity, as well as offering opportunities to help those seeking to live chastely.” – Archbishop Joseph Naumann.  Read below.

Kansas City archbishop promotes fight against porn

By T. Baklinski.  KANSAS CITY, January 28, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City has developed a website (http://www.loveisfaithful.com/) that promotes the archdiocese’s My House Initiative, a program devoted to protecting families and healing couples from pornography.

The website invites people to become aware of the teachings of the Catholic Church about love and sexual intimacy through John Paul II’s Theology of the Body.

The site contains information including internet accountability software,  testimonies, Theology of the Body small groups contact info, counseling resources, support groups, men’s and women’s ministries, and other resources to help families and couples.

“When I was a child, there were social barriers that protected the young from pornography,” Archbishop Naumann told the Catholic World Report (CWR). “But in this age of personal computers and cable television, we have an entirely different environment.”

“People say that pornography is a victimless sin. But that’s not true,” continued Archbishop Naumann. “Many are exploited in the porn industry and we know it causes devastation in marriages.”

The website refers readers to an article by former porn actress April Garris, who, speaking from personal experience in the porn industry, now works to unmask “the deception of pornography, exposing the lie, and bringing all of these myths crashing to the ground.”

Titled “10 Myths Exposed,” Garris’ article brings to light the horrific realities of the pornography industry.

“If you have held to one or more of these myths,” Garris writes, “then you have been sucked into the deception of porn. I hope that laying out these myths has opened your eyes to the reality of porn … a reality that is dark, disgusting, and destructive.”

A video presentation of the My House Initiative has been shown in nearly all of the 110 churches in northeast Kansas, according to the diocesan office. The video and the My House Manual were sent to every U.S. diocese in 2007. This resulted in six dioceses adopting the program, with 36 others expressing interest.

The website calls attention to other aspects of Archbishop Naumann’s fight against porn, including a billboard on the 18th Street Expressway near Kansas Ave, sponsored by donations and viewed over 18,000 times per day; a prayer service to be held near a porn store (Cirilla’s, located at 7528 State Ave.) on February 3, 2011, 4:00 – 5:00 pm; a downloadable handout called 7 Steps to Protect your Family from Pornography; and many other resources.

“We pray that the information on this site will continue to spread to other families, churches, and individuals,” the My House Initiative website states. “We also pray that the thousands of people who are waiting to be rescued from the pornography industry will find hope and healing.”

Archbishop Naumann told CWR that he believes priests have an obligation to promote the virtue of chastity, particularly among the young, while being sensitive to the ages and individual circumstances of their congregations.

“We fail our people if we’re not courageous in preaching about chastity, as well as offering opportunities to help those seeking to live chastely,” Archbishop Naumann said. “When we live chaste lives, we are witnesses of our faith in the world. Chastity also frees us from those things that can enslave us and leave us feeling isolated and sad.”

A Strong Link

As I stated in yesterday’s post, “Why Fight Porn”, I’m going to draw the correlation between pornography and many other social justice issues today.  I stated: “Tomorrow, I will dive into the reality of the effects of pornography, as well as the link pornography has to Life issues and social justice issues (such as divorce, rape, incest, abuse of women, domestic violence, etc.) and will attempt to create for you a strong correlation between these links.  The link between pornography (sexual hedonism and sexual utilitarianism) and many other serious issues is strong!”

Here goes:

People often believe that the sexual revolution of the 60’s is responsible for the state of where our culture is in regards to sexuality.  Although it played (and continues to play) a significant role, it had to start somewhere, right?  Let’s take a look at it.  In the 1930’s, a scientist by the name of Alfred Kinsey performed some “experiments” based on some absolutely atrocious and despicable sexual “experiments”, as he called them.  [I have written a small amount about Kinsey before, and may write more in the future.]  The important piece here is the scope of influence that Kinsey, and his works, had on individuals.  Many people, even Catholics, were influenced by his writings, coming to believe that sex was created for nothing more than the primal urge.  Kinsey believed that we all were born with a natural inclination to sex and that to suppress our natural inclinations and primal desires was to suppress nature and therefore not act in accordance with nature and science.  Why is this important?  Simply, Hugh Hefner.

While a student in college, Hugh Hefner, the infamous creator of the pornography industry, read Kinsey’s famous book, “Sexual Behavior in the Human Male”, printed in 1948.  This book led Hefner to write his thesis on the topic and later, he realized the influence of Kinsey on his decision, in 1953, to create Playboy.  Playboy was the start of the acceptance of soft-core pornography in our culture.  Up to this point in history, sexual hedonism and pornography was a black market type industry.  It was a very, very small industry (to use the word lightly) and a person had to work hard to search it out.  A socially respectable woman would never use pornography.  No socially respectable man would use pornography.  It was disgraceful.  With Playboy, and subsequent “publications” however, pornography became more mainstream and more acceptable.  Since the advent of Playboy, the rise of pornographic materials has spread like wild fire.  As we all know, with the invention of the internet, pornography has spread even more, and into almost every home in the US.  (This doesn’t even take into consideration the magazines/print porn, radio porn, tv porn, cell phone porn, hand-held gaming unit porn and so on.)

From the time of Kinsey, there is a spike in the following categories: divorce, rape, incest, child abuse, drug use, suicide (teen suicide, specifically), domestic violence, physical abuse, child abduction, use in and production of contraceptives, and most notably abortion.  Now, how can this be?  Follow me, I hope it makes perfect sense to you so that you can begin to fight for the truth.

With the “new” mindset, in the 50’s, that sex is utilitarian (merely for use) and hedonistic (pleasure for self), society began to let their guard down morally.  What was once morally reprehensible was now becoming accepted in certain circles, communities and cities.  As people began to explore sexually, marriages and families specifically began to suffer dramatically.  Now, because people are more “open” when it comes to sex, they allow more.  They experiment with more.  They accept more.  (The use of drugs becomes more prevalent during this time, too.)  So a man wouldn’t necessarily have to care about a relationship or responsibility with a woman, he could merely get his sexual pleasure taken care of and move on.  With this lack of responsibility sexually came the desire for contraception.  “If I’m going to sleep with anyone I want, I shouldn’t have to worry about the consequences of a pregnancy.  After all, I’m not in this for a child, or for love, or for life, I’m merely in it for sexual pleasure.”

So, as the desire for contraceptions increased, so too did the desire for abortions.  “Why should I have to keep this baby?  I wasn’t having sex to get pregnant, only for the pleasure.”  Now, as people are more open sexually, less responsible sexually, open to pornography use in the home and in their bedrooms, more willing to kill their unwanted children, and so forth, the family unit suffers big time.  Married couples then lost the responsibility towards one another and divorce increased.

Because of the use of pornography, which experts will tell you, becomes more and more perverted over time, men and women desire different things sexually.  When a man gets turned down by a woman, why shouldn’t he resort to beating her, raping her or other?  Why shouldn’t he go after “easy prey” and abuse children?  Why shouldn’t a number of other things just “naturally” (as Kinsey suggested) just happen and be “normal”?  Obviously, as you read this, if you’re a reasonable and logical human being, you can see the problems here.  It started with sexual disintegration and continues today with more problems than ever.

In review:

• sex was reduced to a primal urge
• pornography came on the scene
• morally reprehensible sexual activity and behavior became accepted
• sex became a recreation
• lack of sexual responsibility entered in
• because people didn’t want responsibility, contraceptives became mainstream
• contraceptives don’t work 100% so abortion was legalized and increased dramatically
• couples are struggling for purpose and divorce increased
• anger becomes mainstream and leads to abuse of all kinds
• people struggle in life when they don’t know their purpose, so they commit suicide
• on and on and on

As you can probably imagine, I could continue on with this list for a long time.  This doesn’t even begin to speak to the emotional or psychological effects on people, nor their relationship with God, nor the effect this entire topic has on the Church.  It’s really despicable what came about from the advent of pornography.  It’s not to say that these things may not have come about without pornography, but we’ll never know that.  Bottom line – we must eradicate pornography!

TrueMan up!

Why Fight Porn?

So what’s the big deal with porn, anyway?  Why do we put so much emphasis on how evil and dangerous porn is?  Why fight porn?

Ask any Catholic priest and he’ll tell you that the majority (majority NOT used lightly here) of male confessions heard in the confessional are oriented towards impurity, lust, sexual misbehavior/acting out and pornography abuse.  This is also not to say that many of the female confessions heard in the confessional don’t also cover these topics.  Many priests I have asked about this topic have told me that upward of 85-90% of the confessions they hear from men are linked to pornography abuse.  This is astonishing and could be, if viewed incorrectly, disheartening.  The devil is attempting to kill our souls, our culture and our Church from the inside out through the use of pornography.  Many believe that it is not a public problem, that if “I” use porn in the quiet of my own home, that it doesn’t effect anyone else.  This is FALSE.

Tomorrow, I will dive into the reality of the effects of pornography, as well as the link pornography has to Life issues and social justice issues (such as divorce, rape, incest, abuse of women, domestic violence, etc.) and will attempt to create for you a strong correlation between these links.  The link between pornography (sexual hedonism and sexual utilitarianism) and many other serious issues is strong!

Before we go, I urge all men to educate themselves on the truth!  Don’t take my word for things, don’t take any one single person’s word for anything.  Do your research and go into it unbiased and open to the truth, for the truth shall set you free!  (This comes from a guy who doubted a ton, thought he could make his own truth and eventually got hit upside the proverbial head with the proverbial 2×4.  Take it from me… do your research!)

TrueMan up!

New Law in Louisville Could Be Big

Taking small steps to curb or end the trafficking of pornography and illicit sexual activity throughout our communities might seem like it doesn’t make a big difference.  The absolutely massive amounts of pornography and scandalous sexual activity (not to mention illegal and morally reprehensible) running rampant everywhere, often seems like a daunting task to overcome.  Many believe that we can’t even make a dent in the $100+ Billion dollar pornography industry.  This is not the case!  Small chunks will eventually make all the difference in the world.  Here’s a great story about a law in Louisville, Kentucky that will help.

Taken from a Louisville, Kentucky based website:

Operators of adult businesses in Louisville are pinning their last hope on an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in a seven-year battle with the city over a no-nudity ordinance they say would effectively shut them down. Unless the nation’s highest court intercedes, city officials say they’ll begin enforcing the ordinance as early as February, effectively ending nude dancing and, eventually, alcohol sales at the city’s strip clubs.  If that happens, then adult businesses may as well shut their doors, said attorney Frank Mascagni III, who represents Déjà Vu and PT’s Showclub, because he said no one is going to go to a strip club to buy an overpriced soda and watch a woman dance in a “G-string and pasties.”

“They’re going to run all of these businesses out of town,” he said of the city.  About 25 adult businesses, including several adult DVD and bookstores, have sued to stop the ordinance, which would eliminate all-nude dancing and alcohol sales, and force club owners and employees to pay licensing fees. Clubs will be allowed to sell alcohol until their current license expires, but they will not be allowed to renew, officials said.  The ordinance also would halt touching and direct tipping of dancers by patrons, prohibit lap dances, and enact a 6-foot buffer zone between dancers and patrons, as well as restrict hours of operation and force clubs to make structural changes inside and outside to deter illegal activity.  Owners of adult businesses have been battling the ordinance, trying to get the courts to rule it unconstitutional, since the Louisville Metro Council passed it in 2004.  They’ve lost each step of the way, most recently last spring before the Kentucky Supreme Court.

Mascagni has until the end of January to file an appeal, and says he’ll do so, even as he acknowledges that chances are slim that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case.  Even if the high court decides to hear the case, Mascagni said, that likely wouldn’t happen until 2012.  City officials, meanwhile, are moving ahead with plans to enforce the ordinance, said Bill Patteson, a spokesman for the Jefferson County Attorney’s Office.  “The process has not stopped,” Patteson said.  Initially, he said, citations and fines will be issued only on violations related to portions of the ordinance that are the easiest to enforce, such as eliminating direct touching and private lap dances.

Mascagni said he felt he had to try to fight the new law because he believes Metro Government is trying to legislate morality.  “Politicians shouldn’t be regulating human behavior,” he said.  Metro Council member Madonna Flood, D-24th District, who was one of the sponsors of the ordinance, said it arose from planning and zoning issues with some newly opened adult bookstores in south Louisville and was intended to combat property devaluation and criminal activity.  It was not designed to “legislate morality” or shut down the businesses, she said.  “They have the right to operate, but I have an obligation to protect property owners,” she said.

Mascagni said club owners have indicated to him they would look at the economic impact of the ordinance and consider closing or moving if profits suffer.  “I believe the government has the right to regulate industries — we all know civilized society needs rules,” Mascagni said. “My problem with this (ordinance) is the city government is making conduct that is otherwise lawful so restrictive that my companies will have to go out of business.”  A letter outlining the guidelines of the ordinance is being crafted, and will be distributed to businesses, Patteson said.  Bill O’Brien, director of the civil division for the County Attorney’s office, called the potential high court appeal a “last desperate attempt to avoid regulations.”  “I really do believe they’ll say no,” he said of the Supreme Court.  Jim Mims, director of the city’s Department of Codes and Regulations, which will oversee enforcement, said he understands some businesses will have to make structural changes to comply with the guidelines, such as moving stages or adding lighting. He said the city will give them 30 to 45 days once they receive the letter to do so.  “We will work with operators and property owners to make sure that is the case,” he said. “Our mission is not just to penalize people; our mission is to get these operations in compliance with the ordinance.”

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