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RFM · Posted: Wed Apr 16, 2008 2:39 pm Post subject:

It is actually a problem which cuts across all party lines. Homeland Security is a very big cash cow for politically connected people, witness the house trailers made with formaldahyde insulation that were purchased for Katrina survivors. The head toxicologist at CDC in Atlanta was told to keep his mouth shut when he repeatedly insisted they were a public health hazard. It seems the trailer manufacturer is a large contributor to the Republican party. The same is true of Blackwater Security which provides exclusive security for the State Department in Iraq and also the airlines which were forced to take hundreds, if not thousands of aircraft out of service for safety inspections FAA officials decided were an expensive burden for them. It is called kick-back, and perfectly legal in America, known as "privatizing", as long as the "political donation" is not directly linked to the Whitehouse or the political party. Needless to say, it will be some time before people begin to insist that loophole be closed, simply because too many people are making a lot of money.

Change begins with educating the public; they need to know these things so that they can demand government take action. Although many people focus on the Iraq war as a moral issue, the fact is that it is driven by a lot of politicians of both parties, and their loyal constituents making a lot of money. I am certain the same is true in Scotland and the UK as well.

Aventinian · Posted: Wed Apr 16, 2008 11:42 pm Post subject:

RFM · Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 1:45 am Post subject:

Hi Rinty,

I found this little article dated 2002 about the discussion taking place in America about the creation of a hybrid mouse-human, an embryo taken to birth. It seems the technique consists in implanting human stem cells in a mouse. The stem cell would retain its DNA which it would share with the mouse's DNA, resulting in a mouse that would have certain distinct human qualities. My information is that these hybrids have been produced in UK and Europe for some time, for laboratory microbiological research.
Read for your self:query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9400E5DA1738F934A15752C1A9649C8B63 - 32k - Cached - Similar pages
Reactivation of Ribosomal RN

Rinty · Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:03 am Post subject:

RFM,

That is not what O'Briens comments were about. He was speaking out about the changes brought in by the latest govt bill, the specific change that his comments were about was allowing human cells to be developed in animal eggs which have stripped of animal nucleus. this is due to the shortage of human eggs available to labs. His speech came on the week of the bill and he referred to catholic MPs voting intentions, the human eared mouse is already covered in previous legislation.

Aventinian,

Still no examples of the Catholic priests in Scotland being arrested protesting against the war. I havent witnessed any myself over the years and have had no response mostly from catholic priests to political events. The best I got was once when the 'peace bus' was coming to cumnock. The Catholic church let us use the car park, but the priest just said hello as he walked past while two protestant ministers turned up to support the bus and wore their CND badges.

Likewise we have many issues here in ayrshire such as the 'friends of dungavel' and palestine forum etc that are well attended and spported by members and clergy of CoS but catholic priests are less likely to get involved in my experience.

Most catholics that I know dont agree with O'Brien on this or wth their church on many issues. The problem that catholics have is that they have no way of expressng this through their leaders, their leaders are appointed by god and cardinals guided by the holy spirit. If they come out with statements that dont reflect the views of catholics it doesnt matter to them and never has.

My wife and my mother are catholics and disagree with him on this and strongly disagree with his view that homosexuals are "deviants". Most others that I know do so as well.

Aventinian · Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 2:13 pm Post subject:

RFM · Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 4:26 pm Post subject:

Hi Rinty,

Could you please provide a reference to the text of Mr. O'Brien's speech? I would be very interested reading it.

A small point perhaps, but the Church has a tradition dating back 2,000 years that bishops must be accepted as worthy by their congregations before they can be ordained. It is done by acclamation and one or more dissents cancels that person's candidacy. During the reformation of course, secular princes and kings got into the act and started deciding who was worthy and who was not and no comment was needed or required from the congregations. That was not the fault of the Church, however. The custom is being revived slowly, but a bishop need not be a priest, the only requirement is approval and being unmarried. A Cardinal is a bishop with duties connected to the running of the Church administrative machinery, one of which is the election of the Pope. God is not consulted or required.

Rinty · Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 1:41 am Post subject:

Aventinian,

Faslane is not the war. I specifcally made the point that the catholic church issued guidance to catholic voters in 2003 ignoring the immorality of the war in Iraq and singled out voting against parties who they saw as being a danger to separate catholic education, namely the SSP and Greens.

Being that those were also the only two parties who opposed the invasion and occupation outright I saw that as hypociritcal.

Faslane is not the same thing but as I said and you evidence seems to suggest, the main religious oposition is from CoS clergy.

But proclaiming opposition to trident does not change their voting instructions in 2003.

RFM,

Your experince of the catholic church is very different to mine, and to every one that I know. I have never heard of the congregation having the power of veto over an appointment. The way it is done, in my experince, is that catholics have no say over what priest they get, what priests become bishops and who becomes cardinal. Those who make the appointments have their judgements trusted by catholics as they are guided by the holy spirit when making appointments.

Dave Coull · Independentista Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1091

RFM wrote "A small point perhaps, but the Church"

(He means the Roman Catholic Church)

"has a tradition dating back 2,000 years"

(RFM means the Roman Catholic Church. He specifically rejects the claims of "reformed" churches that they have a tradition going back 2,000 years, and that the Reformation was not something totally new but a re - forming of what had existed originally but had become corrupted)

"that bishops must be accepted as worthy by their congregations before they can be ordained. It is done by acclamation and one or more dissents cancels that person's candidacy."

There are plenty of occasions on historical record where presbyterian and other reformed congregations have rejected bishops and other ministers foisted upon them. I am not aware of a single case where a Roman Catholic congregation has done this.

"During the reformation of course, secular princes and kings got into the act and started deciding who was worthy and who was not"

It is quite obvious from this that RFM is unfamiliar with the history of the SCOTTISH Reformation. He is probably thinking of what happened in England. The Scottish Reformation of the years around 1560/1561 was a very different matter from what happened in England. Yes, it is true that later in Scottish history there were attempts by the king (by this time the king of England as well as Scotland) to foist bishops on unwilling congregations. The lengths which many protestant congregations went to, in order to reject these attempts, are a matter of historical record.

"and no comment was needed or required from the congregations"

The sheer amount of ignorance of Scottish history which this comment from RFM reveals is unfortunate. Yes, it is true that, so far as Scotland is concerned, princes and kings would have LIKED there to be no comment from the congregations about their choices of bishop, but to imagine that this is what in fact happened reveals a total failure to understand Scottish history.

Rinty says

"RFM, your experince of the catholic church is very different to mine, and to every one that I know. I have never heard of the congregation having the power of veto over an appointment."

It does happen, here in Scotland, but not in the Roman Catholic Church. Many years ago, my brother, as an elder of the Church of Scotland, was one of a local committee delegated by a local congregation to find a new minister for the village (under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, of course). They went and listened to several possibilities at different locations, then they invited three possible candidates to come and preach at the village kirk on consecutive Sundays. One of the three turned down the invitation. The two others accepted. More folk turned up for church on those two weeks than usual, to hear the possible new ministers speak. Then, after consulting with members of the congregation as a whole, the elders made a recommendation, which was generally accepted by the congregation. In accepting one candidate and not the other, the congregation was exercising a power of veto. The belief is that the Holy Spirit is expressed collectively, and not through the holder of any particular office. Of course, this is less likely to happen nowadays, because a shortage of candidates for the ministry means that the Holy Spirit has less to choose from. But the congregation's power of veto still exists. But like I said, not in the Roman Catholic church. RFM's picture of a Catholic church in which the congregations have the power of veto, and that power of veto was actually TAKEN AWAY away at the reformation, is total fantasy.

RFM · Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 4:08 pm Post subject:

Dave Coull,

It was not my intention to open this thread to diatribes of religious bigotry; I was talking about the ethical implications of stem cell research, not the merits of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Protestant Reformation is widely known to scholars of history as commencing around 1517 with the activities of Martin Luther at Weurtemmberg. It is true that subsequently following the lead of the English Monarch, Henry VIII, the Protestant Church in Scotland came to unprecedented power, becoming for all practical purposes a branch of the government of Scotland, a few pages of Scot's history that reflects little credit on the nation's history. Those abuses however have always sought to explain themselves as a necessary and obvious result of the history of Catholicism that went before. My own view is that at bottom nothing more than the greed for power of unscrupulous men wearing the mantle of religion; a plague that brought about the reformation and continued for several hundred years after.

I am not responsible for your lack of "awareness" or to put it more bluntly, what you do not know about the history of the Catholic Church. If you condescended to read a bit, you would have known that several bishops of the Church were not even ordained priests, St. John Chrisostom for one. Simony, or the selling of religious offices, was one of Martin Luther's complaints. He was talking about priests for the most part, but he was also including bishops who were often family members or friends of the ruling nobility.He was also talking about the Investiture Controversy of the 11th century and the Concordat of Worms which was intended to eliminate secular appointment by the nobility.Appointment by the nobility proved to be inseperable from appointment by the congregations.

Today, the ordination of bishops requires the participation of the local synod, or representatives of the parishes.Each parish has a synod, but it does not follow from that that all of the members know or understand or even care what it does. The practice of acclaimation is slowly making a come back and if what I hear Pope Benedict saying is the wave of the future, it may well gather more impetus.

RFM · Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 4:50 pm Post subject:

To Rinty,

I managed to find a copy of the Bill the Cardinal was speaking about, it is
here: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmbills/070/2008070.pdf

This is the original version, not the subsequent versions with amendments and revisions.
The Bill clearly amends a prior piece of legislation of the same title dated 1990 and clearly states in no uncertain terms that "human embryo" means just that. A human ovum fertilized by human sperm. It also defines "admixed embryo" as a human, living embryo to which animal DNA is added. The Bill contemplates as safeguards that no fertilized egg, created within or without a human, which has added animal DNA shall be replaced in a woman, in other words allowed to proceed to birth. That would seem to strengthen safeguards as the implication is that the prior Act would have allowed the placement of a cross fertilized human egg to be placed in an animal and allowed to proceed to birth, exactly the situation in the New York Times article I posted previously. In short any cross fertilized or altered human embryo may not be allowed to proceed to birth.

Although the newspapers are quoted as saying that it means "hollowing out" a human egg and placing animal DNA inside, that is clearly an oversimplfication, to the point of being misleading. The Bill means that you can take a living fertilized human embryo out of a woman, substitute the DNA of an animal, and use the resultant creation for a limited period of time for medical research, you just can not replace it in an animal or a human.

Dave Coull · Independentista Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1091

RFM writes "It was not my intention to open this thread to diatribes of religious bigotry"

Then why did you display such religious bigotry in your diatribe?

It is very common for discussions of one issue to raise other issues. If you would prefer to transfer this particular side-discussion to another topic, perhaps under the "History" section of the Our Scotland forum, then we can do that. But it was you who displayed sectarian bias by your remarks, and that bias needed correction.

"I was talking about the ethical implications of stem cell research, not the merits of the Roman Catholic Church".

Nevertheless, statement of fact, in the course of discussing stem cell research, you displayed religious bigotry.

"The Protestant Reformation is widely known to scholars of history as commencing around 1517"

This is a SCOTTISH forum. The Scottish Reformation happened around 1560, and took an extremely different course from the reformation in some other countries. Your statements showed a degree of ignorance of Scotland, and of Scottish history, which, on a Scottish forum, was bound to be corrected. The gracious thing to do would have been to accept the correction. Instead, you continue to display your bigotry.

Rinty, who comes from a catholic background, and whose wife and mother are practicing catholics, told you "RFM, your experience of the catholic church is very different to mine, and to every one that I know. I have never heard of the congregation having the power of veto over an appointment."

It is a fact that, for hundreds of years, many protestant congregations in Scotland have exercised a power of veto over the appointment of ministers. Our national bard, Robert Burns, wrote a poem exulting, celebrating, glorying in, the rejection of an unpopular minister who had the backing of some very powerful folk, but who was rejected by Rabbie's own local congregation. Rinty has said that "your experience of the catholic church is very different from mine". Can you name ONE instance when a catholic congregation has exercised this power of veto?

RFM · Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 7:25 pm Post subject:

I will do better than that, my bigoted friend.

Read:://www.americancatholic.org/Messenger/Sep2007/books.asp#F1

If it is a particular name and place you need, give me a few hours.

Dave Coull · Independentista Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1091

RFM calls me "my bigoted friend".

(1) I'm not your friend. I don't say this to be positively UN-friendly, but simply to acknowledge the reality that I am just somebody you have come across on a discussion forum. Now, of course, people do sometimes become friends with folk they argue with on discussion forums (that's how I met my wife) but, statement of fact, the present situation is that I am not your friend. We might become friendly in the future, or we might never be friends. Mere human beings cannot really aspire to a divine love for all mankind, in practice we tend to be more limited in our affections.

(2) I have already shown specific ways in which you displayed (probably unconscious) bigotry. I challenge you to quote anything I have said which you consider to be bigoted, and to try to show in what way it is bigoted. By "quote" I mean, of course, my exact words, not some slanted paraphrasing of them.

As for the website you provided, for the Saint Anthony Messenger, I took a look and found "This is an appeal for equality among members of the Church and for the democratic election of bishops. According to O’Callaghan, a professor emeritus in the department of history at Fordham University, that’s the way it was done in the early Church, and should be done today."

That is an appeal for re-formation along the lines of the early church. So, you are saying that a few American catholics are now appealing for a return to doing things the way that Scottish protestants have been seeking to do things for hundreds of years?

RFM · Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 1:15 am Post subject:

I thought that referring to you as my bigotted friend would be less offensive than simply calling you a religious bigot. Foolish me!

Apparently careful reading is not your forte either. In a previous post I pointed out that the business of electing a bishop in the Church is the work of a number of bodies, including the local synod. To you counsel of ministers or elders, to the RC counsel of parishoners. They have had synods for 2000 years. the Protestants for a few years less.
They probably use the same idea because it works well.

Don't be over enthusiastic about my reference to you as a friend, I too tend to be choosy about who I associate and drink with. I even have several friends who are Protestants. I wasn't making a play for your affection.

Dave Coull · Independentista Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1091

RFM’s portrait of a profoundly democratic catholic church will seem unfamiliar to many. As Rinty, whose wife and mother are both practicing catholics, said, “RFM, your experience of the catholic church is very different to mine, and to every one that I know”.

RFM writes “I thought that referring to you as my bigotted friend would be less offensive than simply calling you a religious bigot”.

RFM is American. Nothing wrong with that, so is my wife. RFM is also a practicing catholic. Again, nothing wrong with that, so is my stepson. What is wrong is RFM assuming that anybody who is Scottish and comes from a protestant background must be a bigot. He is assuming that a majority of the population of Scotland are bigots. Now, of course, we do have bigotry here in Scotland, of several varieties, but RFM is wrong to make an automatic assumption that anybody who comes from a category which includes the majority of the population of Scotland must be a bigot. RFM has avoided taking the challenge I made in a previous post. In case you have forgotten what that challenge was, RFM, here it is again: “I challenge you to quote anything I have said which you consider to be bigoted, and to try to show in what way it is bigoted. By ‘quote’ I mean, of course, my exact words, not some slanted paraphrasing of them”.

Historically speaking there have of course been literally hundreds of occasions when Church of Scotland congregations have vetoed ministers, but out of those hundreds I mentioned two specific examples, one involving our national bard Robert Burns, who wrote a poem celebrating this, and the other involving my own brother. RFM has avoided answering the question “Can you name ONE instance when a catholic congregation has exercised this power of veto?”

RFM · Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 1:19 pm Post subject:

Now, now David,

Losing your cool and resorting to gross exaggeration will not help you.

It is within my personal knowledge that an individual was proposed for bishop in the St.Louis diocese here in the midwest about 5 years ago and when his candidacy was announced to the congregations, it brought forth cries of "Ne Axios" (not worthy). Needless to say the event was not publicized at all and I happened to hear about it from a synod member. It also seems to be historical fact that certain high ranking prelates, Abbot Hugh of Cluny for one,was refused a bishopric because of objections raised to his candidacy. These matters are not highly publicized for the obvious reason that it reflects badly on the rejected candidate. I have no doubt that many people do not know how bishops are selected and confirmed nor are they widely told when a candidate is rejected. It does not follow from that however that lack of personal knowledge is proof of none existance of the fact. Ignorance may be bliss but it is also not evidence.

Although I don't think it is any of your business David, my father and his father before him were Protestants as are two of my brothers. We all view each other with the respect due a family member and regard an individual's religious beliefs as his own personal affairs.

Dave Coull · Independentista Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1091

Since it still hasn't been answered, here it is yet again "“I challenge you to quote anything I have said which you consider to be bigoted, and to try to show in what way it is bigoted. By ‘quote’ I mean, of course, my exact words, not some slanted paraphrasing of them”.

RFM · Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 5:42 pm Post subject:

Stop your hysterical bleating David,

This is s thread about the speech of a religious figure opposing certain UK legislation he thinks is immoral. It is not about you.

Get a life!

Dave Coull · Independentista Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1091

RFM wrote "This is a thread about the speech of a religious figure opposing certain UK legislation he thinks is immoral".

That is what it WAS about, until YOU made remarks which changed the subject.

However, since we have now established that your answer to “I challenge you to quote anything I have said which you consider to be bigoted, and to try to show in what way it is bigoted" is that you have no answer, I will happily leave it at that.