18 July 2005
Well, it is I again. It is going to be the start of a new day, a new order in how we will go about our business. I pray to be able to stick with it. Today, I will start with faith.
I have just been reading some really interesting insights from certain members of the staff of Ravi Zacharias. Ravi is a fellow from India, who is also one of the most articulate advocates of the Christian faith in the world. I would heartily recommend anyone who either wants to consider his/her spiritual path--of any kind to look into the writings of him, his staff, and his close associates. The reason I say that is that he is not simply wanting to be so intellectually dishonest as to bar someone to make an unrestrained and objective consideration of the various spiritual paths available for one to choose. One of his associates is another leading advocate, Os Guiness, from Great Britain. He understands the essence of the struggle that has come to emerge between Christianity, secularism, and the other major religions of the world very well. This is a man who as a boy raised by Protestant missionaries in China was forced out in the takeover of Mao Zedong in October 1949 with no food and no clothes other than what they wore; both of his brothers died under such hardship. I read a review of his new book, Unspeakable, and in it I particularly like his three-fold test that he states should be followed for the determination of what worldview to follow:
"Consider the following parable:
"Once upon a point of infinite density, Nothing that was Something went 'Boom!' Then there was Everything. Everything eventually named Something 'Matter,' the tragic character in our story. Sadly, Matter had no mind, yet this makes our tale all the more amazing!"
"Now matter had only one companion, the hero of our fable, a mysterious stranger of unknown origin called Chance. Chance, though blind, was a brilliant artist. Chance taught mindless Matter to paint and paint our pupil did. Matter painted a universe from center to rim on the canvas of a vacuum. And lo, innumerable galaxies emerged filled with infinite wonders, beauty, order, and life. The inspired brush strokes of ignorant Matter, guided by the hands of blind Chance, created together a cosmic masterpiece. But as Matter and Chance were working away they failed to spot out the villain called Time. Time crept in unnoticed back at the boom and was extremely wound up about being stirred from his sleep. Time determined there and then to wind down again and thus rub the masterpiece outas soon as he got hold of that Chance! Chance, being blind, didn't see Time coming and mindless Matter was helpless to intervene."
"Now, Time ruins the painting little by little and brags that by Chance it's just a Matter of Time before the canvas is blank and the boom will swoon and Everything that was Something will be Nothing again, once more upon a pointless point of infinite nothingness, with no Time for Chance to Matter anymore."
This is obviously some articles that demand more thought than over who wins "Dancing With the Stars" (by the way, I'm glad Kelly Monico won). But it's worth it, trust me. It'll challenge the old brain cells, and what you believe in and why.
10:20 p.m., Monday, 18 July:
I also read and now linked an article from another of my favorite websites, that of the Institute for Creation Research, out of El Cajon, California, near San Diego. Dr. Daniel Criswell, a professor at the Institute, which is a graduate school widely respected in the anti-evolutionary science field (awarding Masters' degrees in several disciplines), wrote the article introducing ICR's venture into genomics, the study of genetic DNA and cell sequencing from the human gene map, as well as that of dozens of other species which have been successfully compiled. Dr. Criswell focused on an expose on earlier, widely publicized stories of supposed findings by evolutionary scientists that claimed a 98.5% similarity between the genetics of chimpanzees and humans. He demonstrates the flaws in the studies in two important ways: 1)the limitation of other studies to certain kinds of proteins to the neglect of many others; and 2) the inability of the number of actual non-matches in the two species' genomes, about 10% or more, to have occurred through mutation over 5 million years, which is central to the claims of Darwin and his scientific 'descendants' of common ancestry of man and chimp diverging through evolutionary processes. Check it out, it will challenge you.
Supreme Court Update:
Since Chief Justice Rehnquist announced last week that he is not going to retire yet (will within the year), and no other announcements have been made, either from Justices John Stevens (yet) or Ruth Ginsberg (again, probably not until at least the end of the year), there is now only the one vacancy, that of Justice O'Connor that is at issue. According to Red State, it looks like President Bush is going to settle on a woman, and that one is Judge Edith Joy Clement, associate judge of the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, Lousiana, and an apparent conservative. The word is that the announcement will come tomorrow, and that enough Democrats are going to go with the Republicans in the U.S. Senate that any attempt to stop the nomination will fail, and her confirmation will be fairly easy.
Karl Rove Update:
I won't waste time elaborating anymore about the soon-to-be unsuccessful smear attempt of Karl Rove, President Bush's political director, but I will refer you to an another article of a contributor to Red State, Leon H. In it he points out 13 major questions to answer on the matter, the answers of which point out two undeniable facts: 1) Karl Rove did nothing wrong; and 2) The guilty parties are the accusers, former diplomat Joseph Wilson and his wife, CIA analyst Valerie Plame. Enough said.
12:08 a.m., Tuesday, 19 July:
I will say I am touched by one article in the Wall Street Journal online edition. Akbar Ganji, the leading human rights and democracy activist in Iran, is in the 39th day of a hunger strike in a Tehran prison cell on trumped-up charges typical for any tyrannical regime, the mullocracy of Iran's Ali Khameni no exception. President Bush has publicly condemned Ganji's imprisonment and called for his release. UN Sec.-Gen. Kofi Annan, however, has pretended to not know about Mr. Ganji's situation and refused to comment. Typical, the bastard is a lying, sniveling, graft-gouging coward!! The Journal has included several of Mr. Ganji's quotes in a main article, and included a link to a website dedicated to telling the world about his situation. Mr. Ganji's stand for human rights and democracy is worthy of Martin Luther King, Lech Walesa, Vaclav Havel, and Ronald Reagan. I am proud to beat my drum for his benefit and support. This is further proof that those who believe that Islam cannot possibly provide an environment for democracy is just flat dead wrong. It may need to be a pretty seriously watered-down version of Islam, with plenty of room for Christianity to make itself known in an environment of freedom, but it can work nonetheless. Check this story out, and especially his website, for sure. This man is the real authentic article--a patriot and lover of liberty.
12:54 a.m., Tuesday, 19 July:
In U.S. Immigration Law Blog, operated by a leading immigration lawyer out of Maryland, they have reported on a report released by the U.S. Department of State, that 1st and 2nd employment-based preference visas for permanent foreign workers have not used up all the places that will be allotted for the rest of the fiscal year. That is important news especially for workers from China and India. The blogger-lawyer says that visa slots for workers from those two countries may run out by the middle of September, but that would only mean that such visa applicants would only need to wait two weeks, until October 1st and the beginning of the U.S. government's new fiscal year, and even that probably will not happen. So that is good news for both workers and employers.
Oh well, got to go. Am starting to cut back on my sign-off time. Will be back in about 10-12 hours. Adios.
