The Answer Is 7:15

Below, the full advertisement for the SexPo week's upcoming events. What a disgrace to Georgetown, and a rebuke to any pretense that it has anything seriously to do with Roman Catholic moral teaching. The people pushing this garbage are the enemy, front and center. As outrageous as this is on its face, I do wonder what the university's president and trustees think about themselves and their mission. Do they really believe they are being remotely faithful to the school's mission by allowing a pornographer to give a presentation about open marriages on campus? A priest I know once told me that every priest should serve keeping front and center that one day, he will have to give an account to God of the souls of all those under his care. Do you think such a thought ever comes within a hundred miles of the minds of the clerics and laymen who have responsibility for Georgetown University and the formation of the minds and characters of the students who pass through there? Please.

Belief.net se enfada porque la sobrina de Pynchon, Tristan Taormino, va a Georgetown a hablar probablemente de sus dos libros sobre el sexo anal femenino, de sus peliculas meta-pornograficas, de sus juguetes de boutique erotica de alto standing, de las relaciones MUY abiertas, o de cualquier cosa similar que se le pase por la cabeza. Si. Por la cabeza.

Y ahora un momento serio

2009-02-22T15:10:00.001-05:00

Buena parte de los catorce ex militares salvadoreños implicados en la matanza de seis sacerdotes jesuitas, cinco de ellos españoles, el ama de llaves y su hija, regentan hoy empresas, disfrutan de retiros y cargos, frecuentan cuartos de banderas y se pertrechan contra la persecución de la Audiencia Nacional y de la Asociación Proderechos Humanos de España (APDHE). Varios cabildean políticamente para impedir que la ley de amnistía de 1993 sea derogada por el Gobierno que salga de las elecciones del próximo 15 de marzo en El Salvador.

Veinte años de impunidad.

Si Ratzi no existiera habria que inventarlo...

2009-02-20T22:01:00.001-05:00

Early this week, Pope Benedict compounded his troubles by elevating a bishop who blamed New Orleans for Hurricane Katrina and called Harry Potter satanic. How does a pope who’s not that ideologically different from the beloved John Paul II manage to screw up so badly?

Enjoy.

Autobuses para todos

2009-02-02T10:14:00.005-05:00

Vengan y jueguen con el generador de autobuses ateos.

Benedict on a Ball

2009-01-29T07:24:00.001-05:00

The ultra-right political views of the Lefebvrists were not unknown to church leaders who offered to lift the excommunication. Lefebvre had spoken despairingly of how the Allied liberation of France from the Nazis represented "the victory of Freemasonry against the Catholic order of [Vichy leader Marshal] Petain," and his movement had given sanctuary to the fugitive French collaborator Paul Touvier, who was arrested in the society's priory in Nice in 1989. Touvier was charged and convicted of ordering the assassination of seven Jews in Lyon in 1944 as well as other crimes against humanity. A priest of the order sat beside him during his trial as his spiritual advisor. Lefebvre supported the Front National Party of Jean-Marie Le Pen, claiming the support was based on Le Pen's opposition to abortion.

Ratzi, Ratzi, Ratzi...

Facebook is evil

2009-01-25T10:12:00.001-05:00

So Benedict says. Because denying the Holocaust and raping deaf-mute children is not.

Celebrate the Birth of Your Debt Free Life

2009-01-18T19:16:00.001-05:00

Enough said.

(Aunque yo pensaba que todos los seres humanos estaban en perpetua deuda con Cristo por dar su vida en la cruz. Igual me equivoco. Hmm...)

Evangelicalism grows a pair

2009-01-18T07:51:00.001-05:00

Driscoll found his way into this tradition largely on his own. He recently earned a master’s degree through an independent-study program he arranged at a seminary in Portland, Ore. Years ago, paperback reprints of old Puritan treatises in the corner of a local bookstore piqued his interest in Reformation theology. He came to admire Martin Luther, the vulgar, beer-swilling theological rebel who sparked the Reformation. “I found him to be something of a mentor,” Driscoll says. “I didn’t have all the baggage he did. But you can see him with a quill in one hand and a drink in the other. He married a brewer and renegade nun. His story is kind of indie rock.”

Driscoll disdains the prohibitions of traditional evangelical Christianity. Taboos on alcohol, smoking, swearing and violent movies have done much to shape American Protestant culture — a culture that he has called the domain of “chicks and some chickified dudes with limp wrists.” Moreover, the Bible tells him that to seek salvation by self-righteous clean living is to behave like a Pharisee. Unlike fundamentalists who isolate themselves, creating “a separate culture where you live in a Christian cul-de-sac,” as one spiky-haired member named Andrew Pack puts it, Mars Hillians pride themselves on friendships with non-Christians. They tend to be cultural activists who play in rock bands and care about the arts, living out a long Reformed tradition that asserts Christ’s mandate over every corner of creation.

And so this blog starts 2009, full of Neocalvinist testosterone.

CHRISTMAS!!!

2008-12-28T18:22:00.001-05:00

I know, I know, nothing to do with the main topic of this blog, but who could resist the temptation to post this gallery?

Behold, I will tell you a mystery...

2008-12-26T04:13:00.002-05:00

El día después de celebrar el solsticio de invierno y el nacimiento de Sir Isaac Newton, Nacho se da el gusto de mostrar en Público el lamentable estado de las creencias religiosas en Ex-panya y la mínima regularidad en la práctica católica. No es raro que el Cardenal Rouco, tan amigo de Razzi, ansíe una segunda evangelización militante a la Concilio de Trento.

And then that guy in the flamboyant dress said...

2008-12-23T04:25:00.002-05:00

El papa Benedicto XVI se ha vuelto ha pronunciar hoy contra los cambios de sexo. Ha precisado que Dios creó al ser humano como "hombre" y "mujer" y abogó por una "ecología del hombre, que le proteja de la autodestrucción".

"No es una metafísica superada si la Iglesia habla de la naturaleza del ser humano como hombre y mujer y pide que este orden de la creación sea respetado", ha afirmado el Pontífice ante los cardenales y miembros de la Curia romana, a los que recibió en la tradicional audiencia de intercambio de felicitaciones con motivo de la Navidad.

Más.

Chuck Norris to the rescue

2008-12-22T14:23:00.003-05:00

Or how to make those Jesus jackers really, really, really sorry:

'Tis the season to be Jesus stealing? Away in a manger, no Christ for the bed? It has become a new Christmas fetish – neutering nativities by jacking the Jesus. Just over the past week, dozens of mini-messiahs have been nabbed from nativities across the country.

More. How many girls thought of borrowing tiny (although always oh so powerful) Chuck Norris action figures from their brothers to make their Christmas stories even more exciting?

Iglesias, iglesias, iglesias

2008-12-07T15:34:00.003-05:00

Esta fabulosa locura es de Noruega, esta maravilla de Mikonos.

Mas.

Repent ye, Godless Obamites

2008-12-02T06:38:00.001-05:00

A Roman Catholic priest has told parishioners they should confess if they voted for Barack Obama because the president-elect supports abortion.

The Rev. Joseph Illo says his parishioners at St. Joseph's Catholic Church in Modesto shouldn't risk losing their "state of grace" by receiving communion sacrilegiously. He delivered the message in a Nov. 21 letter and during mass.

In an interview this week with the Modesto Bee, Illo says he sent the letter because Catholic teaching requires that people go to confession when they commit a mortal sin.

Cuando uno oye cosas asi no puede evitar pensar que de verdad hay que terminar "lo que empezamos en el 36".

Christmas bigotry

2008-11-18T10:52:00.002-05:00

I am troubled by the growing trend among retailers to secularize the Christmas season by marginalizing or refusing to use the word "Christmas" in marketing and promotional materials. Christmas is fundamentally a Christian holiday, and efforts to secularize Christmas are offensive.

I am joining Focus on the Family Action’s "I Stand for Christmas" campaign to call on retailers to stop purging "Christmas." I stand for Christmas, and I urge you to stand for Christmas as well by highlighting "Christmas" in your stores, catalogs and Web sites. Further, I plan to consult Focus on the Family Action's Shopping Guide, which categorizes retailers by their treatment of "Christmas," while making my Christmas purchases this year.

Stop this religious genocide!! Salon War Room has more about this holy defense of Christmas. Never give up, keep up the good fight!

Palabra de Jesuita, palabra de Dios

2008-11-16T09:44:00.001-05:00

"Las élites son necesarias. Un mundo sin líderes, sin gente que pueda estudiar los problemas con cierta profundidad, no es practicable. Nos llevaría al caos, y a un caos sin horizontes. Hay que reconocer con humildad que no podemos cambiar las cosas sin un equipo de líderes. Y los jesuitas deben contribuir, como muchos otros, a la formación de esos líderes. Al mismo tiempo, hay que abrir la puerta a una educación más elaborada a los que no pueden costeársela. Es algo que se ha hecho siempre. Yo mismo estudié en el colegio de La Salle de Barcelona con una beca. Es una manera de conseguir que las élites no vengan condicionadas por los recursos económicos, una manera de poner al servicio de la sociedad todo el talento del que disponemos. De lo que se trata es de educar a unas élites para que se pongan al servicio del pueblo, y educar al pueblo para que entienda que hacen falta distintas funciones, que no haya una proletarización ideológica que al final lleve a errores".

Más.

1 Thimothy 2:11

2008-11-15T22:20:00.002-05:00

Y, claro, van y lo amenazan con meterle una pedazo de excomunión.

Mientras, en otra galaxia, se descubre que los británicos se corren poco en un contenedor de plástico y exigen que las cosas cambien. Resulta que los genes escandinavos no les gustan. Estos ingleses...

Straight from Maria de Zayas

2008-11-14T15:38:00.002-05:00

Dice doña María: "Anda, boba, que tú te engañaste; que a los hombres no se les ha de creer sino es cuando dicen: Domine, no sum dignus".

Lo que uno no entiende es por qué la derecha italiana ha puesto el grito en el Cielo por esta campaña. No es que esten precisamente usando a Cristo para vender lencería. Aunque seguramente el problema no es qué usan, sino para qué lo usan. Que si él la mató, algo habría hecho ella...

by Ruth Smythers, beloved wife of The Reverend L.D. Smythers

2008-11-12T16:57:00.004-05:00

INSTRUCTION AND ADVICE FOR THE YOUNG BRIDE

To the sensitive young woman who has had the benefits of proper upbringing, the wedding day is, ironically, both the happiest and most terrifying day of her life. On the positive side, there is the wedding itself, in which the bride is the central attraction in a beautiful and inspiring ceremony, symbolizing her triumph in securing a male to provide for all her needs for the rest of her life. On the negative side, there is the wedding night, during which the bride must pay the piper, so to speak, by facing for the first time the terrible experience of sex.

At this point, dear reader, let me concede one shocking truth. Some young women actually anticipate the wedding night ordeal with curiosity and pleasure! Beware such an attitude! A selfish and sensual husband can easily take advantage of such a bride. One cardinal rule of marriage should never be forgotten: GIVE LITTLE, GIVE SELDOM, AND ABOVE ALL, GIVE GRUDGINGLY. Otherwise what could have been a proper marriage could become an orgy of sexual lust.

On the other hand, the bride's terror need not be extreme. While sex is at best revolting and at worse rather painful, it has to be endured, and has been by women since the beginning of time, and is compensated for by the monogamous home and by the children produced through it.

Leyendo a Ms. Smythers y comparándola con las ninfómanas cristianas, se puede decir, con los Beatles, it's getting better...

Fuck giving Larry Summers the job, hire the Virgin Mary instead

2008-11-09T18:21:00.002-05:00

El cardenal arzobispo de Madrid, Antonio María Rouco Varela, y el alcalde de la capital, Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón, han pedido hoy a la Virgen de la Almudena, patrona de Madrid, ayuda para todos aquellos que sufren dificultades debido a la crisis económica.

Durante la homilía de la misa celebrada en la plaza Mayor con motivo de la festividad de la patrona, que ha reunido a miles de madrileños alrededor de su imagen, Rouco Varela ha señalado que la "maternidad de la virgen" se necesita "con nueva urgencia" ya que Madrid "también sufre las consecuencias de la crisis de la economía".

Más.

For Unto Us a Child Is Born

2008-11-08T18:03:00.000-05:00

The conception of the Mediterranean as the meeting of three continents goes back to classical Greece. But it took a further intellectual leap to conceive of their inhabitants as a collectivity. You can have Europe, Africa, and Asia without thinking of Europeans, Africans, and Asians as particular kinds of people.

David Levering Lewis's rich and engaging God's Crucible shows that it took two things to make Europeans think of themselves as a people. One was the creation of a vast Holy Roman Empire by the six-foot-four, thick-necked, fair-haired Frankish warrior king we know as Charlemagne. The other was the development, in the Iberian peninsula on the southwestern borders of his dominion, of the Muslim culture of Spain, which the Arabs called al-Andalus. In the process that made the various tribes of Europe into a single people, what those tribes had in common and what distinguished them from their Muslim neighbors were both important. This is, by now, a familiar idea. But God's Crucible offers a more startling proposal: in making the civilization that modern Europeans inherit, the cultural legacy of al-Andalus is at least as important as the legacy of the Catholic Franks. In borrowing from their great Other, they filled out the European Self.

Nada menos que mi tocayo Appiah escribe sobre God's Crucible: How Muslims made Europe de David Leveris Lewis en el New York Review of Books. Cosita güena.

To be played to the beat of The Temptations' "Get Ready"

2008-11-06T13:34:00.003-05:00

If Obama is really The One, he deserves to be in the company of the Master and the Slave, Moses, The Diving Nun and, of course, our beloved Baby Jesus.

Jesuits for Obama

2008-11-03T09:09:00.003-05:00

"The pontiff's book is a profession of faith in the good Jesus. Cardinal Martini puts us in front of Jesus from another perspective. Jesus is the friend of the publican and the sinner. He listens to the questions of young people. He stirs things up. He fights with us against injustice."

This is a Jesus that reaches across the aisle, this is a Jesus that is over with some old fights, this is a Jesus that promotes a change we can believe in, this is a Jesus that is going to fight for the middle class... In sum, Jesuits for Obama.

[On a completely different note, who could deny the Coen brothers' Burn After Reading is pure 19th-century-styled realism?]

Don't know much about Theology?

2008-10-31T21:15:00.002-04:00

That's too bad, son. Go get yourself some sweet divinity and to hell with physics and math and history and always sinful biology and anatomy (for who but a closet heathen would busy himself so much with the vanishing flesh?). Yeah, son, to hell with them, and go open those sacred books until your Bible is cracked in half. Benedict, you're awesome...

Divine wisdom, on the other hand, is "following the mind of Christ, the one who opens the eyes of the heart to follow the path of truth and love," the Pontiff added.

Thus when St. Paul makes this distinction between types of wisdom, Benedict XVI explained, what he denounces is "the poison of false wisdom, which is human pride. It is not, therefore, knowledge in itself that can cause harm, but rather presumption, the 'vainglory' from what one has come -- or imagines he has come -- to know."

The Apostle, the Pope continued, "doesn't want in any way to lead to an undervaluing of the human effort necessary for knowing, but rather places himself on another plane: Paul is interested in emphasizing -- and he does it without any half measures -- what it is that is truly worthwhile for salvation and that which, on the other hand, can bring division and ruin."

What St. Paul opposes, he affirmed, is "a type of intellectual pride, in which man, even knowing a lot, loses his sensitivity for the truth and his willingness to open himself to the novelty of divine action."

Behond, a virgin shall conceive indeed

2008-10-31T14:12:00.001-04:00

Red Sex, Blue Sex, en el New Yorker.

Halloween is for heathens

2008-10-30T14:13:00.004-04:00

"No es una fiesta inocente porque es la noche del año nuevo para los brujos. Doreen Irving, bruja y posteriormente convertida al cristianismo alertó a los padres sobre esta fiesta donde incluso los sacrificios de niños formaban parte del ritual festivo".

Con lo sano que es llevar a los críos al cementerio. Menos mal que los obispos nos muestran el camino recto, frente a abominables herejes que buscan humillar lo más sagrado.

Behold, a virgin shall conceive...

2008-10-30T07:27:00.002-04:00

The Christian Right, as both Dagmar Herzog and the Republican nomination of Sarah Palin make abundantly clear, is not anti-sex. “We are the ones with the babe on the ticket”, gushes the conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh. “Run to the arms of your prince and enter your dream”, advises the author, media star and abstinence-before-marriage advocate Lisa Bevere in her book Kissed the Girls and Made Them Cry, on sale at Palin’s old Pentecostal church in Wasilla. Evangelical conservatives have outflanked their enemies: “Christian sex”, and not what the revolutionaries of the 1960s had to offer, turns out to be “the most amazing sex on God’s Green earth”.

All of this is not really surprising. Protestantism from the very beginning defined itself as being, roughly speaking, on the side of sexuality. Being married, the Reformers argued, was not second best; the putative celibacy of Catholic priests, monks and nuns was not only theologically misguided but also a front for hypocrisy and perversion. Methodism was attacked in the eighteenth century for being too sexy; what else was one to make of all its excited talk about “love feasts”? And even if, in early twentieth-century America, the peccadilloes of preachers were not exactly condoned, they were explicable as the all too human failures of men in a world where passion might well break its bounds. God forgives sinners. Still, there was something new going on in the last three decades of the twentieth century.

Nada menos que Thomas Laqueur escribe sobre Sex in Crisis: The New Sexual Revolution and the Future of American Politics en el Times Literary Supplement. Cosita güena.

With a hideous creature no one likes

2008-10-21T15:41:00.001-04:00

Okay, nothing to have to do with religion, but this is priceless. McMaverick?

"The Lord will take care of us"

2008-10-21T15:08:00.000-04:00

Don't know much about history

2008-10-16T21:31:00.003-04:00

Don't know much about theology, either. After all, she cannot claim to be an A student. But she's NOT trying to be. I guess Christian theology is for commies.

Sarah Palin’s religious upbringing and affiliation leans heavily towards the world of Pentecostalism, a brand of basis Protestantism that has—in the minds of mainstream theologians—been viewed as long on enthusiasm and short on theology.

More in Harper's.

[Que Dios me perdone, pero hay que ver las joyas que uno se encuentra cuando entra en Fox News: Palin afirma que el Altísimo bendijo a "América" dándole petróleo y gas natural]

In Western Europe, Christianity seems a fading residue.

2008-10-12T22:30:00.002-04:00

The Times Literarty Supplement uses Sarah Palin as an excuse to have a look at Pentacostalism.

And The Atlantic reviews things that White People Like.

Now, after having played T.S. Eliot, it's really time to go to bed.

A quiet Apocalypse?

2008-10-12T22:21:00.003-04:00

At least it is definitely tackier... John, after all, that big drama queen of the end of days, had a thing for the epic flamboyant gesture.

Still, there's no point in worrying. If we're going to be plunged into some kind of barbaric medieval dark age, I might as well be philosophical about it, because there's no way I'll survive more than a month. I'd be hopeless at fighting over basic resources and don't have any essential manual skills, such as the ability to hunt and skin rats. Perhaps I can learn the lute and become a minstrel, or perform bawdy jigs in exchange for pennies. Assuming there are any pennies. Hey, maybe just before all currency is finally declared worthless we'll get to experience the whole wheelbarrows-full-of-worthless-banknotes thing, like they did in Germany just before the war. That'd be a blast.

It all seems particularly bizarre, because just over a week ago I was in Las Vegas, as part of a US road trip I'm writing up for the Travel section. The casino put me up in an outrageous suite the size of a millionaire's bachelor pad. It had a pool table, a butler, and a shower in the lounge with a lapdancing pole in the middle of it. The windows looked out over the Las Vegas strip; specifically over the multimillion-dollar fountain show at the front of Bellagio. I visited a nightclub full of pricks who danced around tossing banknotes in the air, then returned to the suite, which alongside a pool table and a butler, also came equipped with about six gigantic, wall-mounted HD plasma TVs, every single one of which was screaming bad news about the economy. I felt like I was trapped inside a terrifying satirical sci-fi flick.

And it had to happen, obviously.

More.

Christian nymphos... and no, it's not the title of a cheesy erotic 70s movie

2008-10-04T14:52:00.004-04:00

We are women with excessive sexual desire for our husbands! There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. In fact, God wants us to be madly in love with our husbands. He wants us to keep that fire burning in our marriage beds! We have the Song of Solomon as a perfect example of a Christ honored union where the two people are obviously intoxicated with each other.

You can even expand your knowledge of sexual toys thanks to them, the Christian nymphos. Who would have thought they'd use something called a triple stimulator?

Courtesy of Tom Perrotta.

De los métodos de observación

2008-10-04T08:54:00.004-04:00

Va y suelta Benedicto XVI, con la misma naturaleza de consideración absurda, incomprensible, del opispo de Hipona, ese tipo cuya biografía se puede comprar de saldo en los sótanos de la Harvard Bookstore, con una rebaja de precio que es, sin duda, una afrenta, una burla, una humillación intolerable impuesta por una panda de rojos comecuras sin decencia, sin corazón, sin lo que hay que tener para eliminar su halitosis, su permanente mal aliento. Dios no los perdone. En fin, a lo que iba. Dice Benedicto:

"La técnica no puede sustituir la maduración de la libertad cuando está en juego el amor", concluye el Papa, y para acabar exhorta a los curas a predicar a las parejas un mensaje "que les oriente a entender con el corazón el maravilloso diseño que Dios ha inscrito en el cuerpo humano".

Con lo fácil que sería recomendar la Coca-Cola. Con lo necesario que sería, en Italia, hablar desde el mismo Vaticano de alguna otra cosa.

One more before you leave for Phillip Pullman's land...

2008-09-30T17:52:00.003-04:00

In fact, when it comes to banning books, religion is the worst reason of the lot. Religion, uncontaminated by power, can be the source of a great deal of private solace, artistic inspiration, and moral wisdom. But when it gets its hands on the levers of political or social authority, it goes rotten very quickly indeed. The rank stench of oppression wafts from every authoritarian church, chapel, temple, mosque, or synagogue – from every place of worship where the priests have the power to meddle in the social and intellectual lives of their flocks, from every presidential palace or prime ministerial office where civil leaders have to pander to religious ones.

My basic objection to religion is not that it isn't true; I like plenty of things that aren't true. It's that religion grants its adherents malign, intoxicating and morally corrosive sensations. Destroying intellectual freedom is always evil, but only religion makes doing evil feel quite so good.

You gotta love this guy.

Palabra de Dios, Palabra del Presidente del Tribunal Supremo

2008-09-24T10:42:00.004-04:00

Que no es exactamente lo mismo que el Tribunal Constitucional. Aun así, sorprende, acojona. Para que luego digan que las únicas teocracias en el mundo occidental son el Vaticano y los US de Bush. Copio y pego de Nacho:

“Sólo en amar a Cristo y hacerle amar, en una vida coherente y cabal, se encuentra la única y verdadera Justicia”

“En cualquier caso, los católicos obedeciendo al Papa, nunca nos equivocamos”

“Sólo Dios, el Bien Supremo, es la base inamovible y la condición insustituible de la moralidad”

“El nacionalismo es la negación de patriotismo, pues mientras el patriotismo, amando lo propio, estima también lo ajeno, el nacionalismo desprecia todo lo ajeno y si no logra destruirlo, trata de apropiárselo”

“Quien negara a la persona humana más inocente y débil, la persona humana ya concebida pero todavía no nacida, cometería una gravísima violación del orden moral”

Carlos Dívar, nuevo presidente del Consejo General del Poder Judicial y del Tribunal Supremo a propuesta de Zapatero.

Y la mejor frase de todas: “Me produce una profunda preocupación cuando observo que algunos grupos quieren imponer a la comunidad internacional puntos de vista ideológicos o modelos de vida que defienden pequeños sectores de la sociedad. Quizás esto sea más patente en campos como la defensa de la vida o la salvaguardia de la familia”.

A mí también me preocupa.

Christian Porn Film Climaxes With Birth Of Child

2008-09-22T07:53:00.002-04:00

"...fastforward to scenes of Bible reading..."

Priceless. Gracias, Alberto.

What's on Bristol Palin's iPod?

2008-09-18T16:11:00.000-04:00

Para el obispo de la Diócesis de Almería y alto cargo de la Conferencia Episcopal, el que la sociedad no perciba la importancia que la religión tiene en la "fundamentación de la moral y la promoción de la dignidad de la persona y de sus derechos fundamentales" desemboca en que "millones de jóvenes, electrizados por el rock y el gregarismo adormecedor de la movida semanal" se entreguen a la "práctica banal y destructiva de la sexualidad".

Palabra de obispo. Con lo profundo y constructivo que es pasar el sábado entre monaguillos...

Bishop takes queen

2008-09-17T11:28:00.001-04:00

Straight from Bocaccio. Because, when it comes to it, who gives a shit about whether Jesus is your friend.

"Jesus is a friend of mine"

2008-09-14T19:48:00.003-04:00

Y con este estremecedor video empieza la temporada 2008-2009.

Si es que se visten como put@s

2008-08-13T15:54:00.003-04:00

Uno. Dos.

"Britain is a mess"

2008-08-13T03:38:00.004-04:00

Make me a Christian, the reality, comes now to the rescue.

"Earn your right to wear white"

2008-07-28T18:44:00.002-04:00

"Panty-minimalists love our casual thong that covers sweet spots without covering your assets; putting an end to panty-lines. This under-goodie is "outta sight" in low-rise pants. Toss these message panties onstage at your favorite rock star or share a surprise message with someone special ... later".

The Made in USA part leaves me so happy. It conjures up a big nation of thong-makers united under the sky. Via.

Because four is better than Three

2008-07-22T07:50:00.000-04:00

Via.

Amenazas de muerte por una galletita

2008-07-19T08:41:00.003-04:00

Un estudiante universitario estadounidense ha desencadenado una ola de intolerancia por parte de un grupo de adeptos a un culto mistérico del Medio Oriente. Webster Cook, el estudiante en cuestión, se infiltró en una ceremonia del culto y se llevó uno de los elementos más sagrados, una fina galletita redonda sin sal que se da a los creyentes para que la ingieran. Según afirma el culto, las galletitas (reunidas en una copa) son por las palabras del oficiante en la carne del fundador de la secta, que murió hace cerca de dos mil años. Para los que participan de esta extraña creencia, el consumo de estas galletitas sin sabor (una mágicamente transformadasforma simbólica de canibalismo) les permite unirse místicamente con el fundador, un miembro de una etnia semítica que habitaba los alrededor del Mar de Galilea.

Si bien el valor monetario de la galletita es ínfimo, y la interferencia en la ceremonia del culto puede ser considerada una falta menor, a los ojos de los adeptos Cook cometió un gravísimo crimen cuando, en vez de ingerir la galletita, se retiró llevándosela consigo, lo cual comparan con un secuestro. El solo acto de no cumplir con el rito prescripto pone además a Cook en situación de ser acusado de profanación, término técnico que se refiere al daño o destrucción de cosas tenidas por sagradas.

Cook ha recibido amenazas de muerte de miembros del culto, cuyos líderes han calificado su retención de la galletita como similar a una "toma de rehén" y como un "crimen de odio". La administración de la casa de altos estudios ha cedido, hasta ahora, a la presión de esta secta, que constituye un importante soporte financiero para la universidad.

Más y más. El que la ha liado de veras, sin embargo, es un profesor rojo y ateo de Minnesota.

The Monty Pynthon on The Last Supper

2008-07-19T06:39:00.002-04:00

You'll never see this in New Zealand

2008-07-19T05:24:00.004-04:00

After all, they are Australians. Zenit dixit:

Anthony Gordon, 34, who played the part of the Apostle Bartholomew, admitted to ZENIT he struggled to contain his emotion when the Pope came out with Cardinal George Pell, the archbishop of Sydney, and Cardinal Stanislaw Rylko, president of the Pontifical Council for the Laity.

"When [the Pontiff] came out, you could feel the warmth and excitement from the crowd. You had this compulsion to smile and to dissipate in the rapturous feelings," the actor said.

Tears rolled down the cheeks of many onlookers for this performance of epic proportions, made more so by the backdrop of an intense Australian sunset.

29-year-old Mario Gabrael, who played one of the Roman guards, admitted, "It was difficult to concentrate on our parts at times because of the emotion associated with it."

Meanwhile, Belladonna has offered to donate some of her own time to help set up a "meaningful set of exercises for priests to help them deal with sexual tension and stress".

[Pero no todo son risas. Algunos malos cristianos nunca aprenden que han de poner la otra mejilla y callarse]

Lectura para el verano

2008-07-15T06:39:00.002-04:00

Como empezar a describir el loco mundo de Hazteoir? En fin, quien pudiera lanzarse a leer todas estas fabulosas recomendaciones.

* La diferencia prohibida. Tony Anatrella. Ed.Encuentro.

Relacionado con la misma temática que el anterior (disolución familiar provocada por la ideología de género), Anatrella –jesuita, psicoanalista, consultor del Consejo Pontificio para la Familia- aborda un aspecto esencial: uno de los rasgos que caracteriza a la sociedad actual es la ausencia del padre; no una ausencia física –aunque también- sino una ausencia moral y psíquica; la abolición del padre y del “código paterno” ha suscitado en los hijos la eliminación de todo lo que eso llevaba consigo; eliminando al padre se ha eliminado el vínculo de pertenencia. El 68 marcó el apogeo de la desestabilización del concepto de autoridad, con la consiguiente “destrucción” del padre, y se ha reducido la familia a un solo código, el materno, por lo que se está convirtiendo el lugar del sentimiento, de los cuidados, de las necesidades. Además, el adulto juega a ser niño, y el niño a ser adulto; la violencia generacional y entre iguales se banaliza. En la sociedad actual falta una figura paterna que complemente y se oponga a la materna. Es ésta una ausencia dramática porque, a juicio de Anatrella, es en la oposición padre-madre donde el niño descubre nociones familiares básicas, la autoridad, la feminidad, la masculinidad, la diferencia, y se descubre a sí mismo. Anatrella analiza fríamente las características psicológicas que se esconden bajo las distintas formas de familia: el concubinato, el matrimonio provisional, las familias monoparentales. La desestabilización familiar alentada por la sociedad actual provoca inestabilidad, inmadurez, que el niño, cuando se haga adulto, se muestre incapaz de actuar como tal. Aborda igualmente un aspecto tabú: en esta sociedad adicta al sexo y adepta al igualitarismo, la homosexualidad aparece como el modelo de comportamiento por excelencia. Por doquier asistimos a la hiperlegitimación de la homosexualidad, a la idealización de sus prácticas. Resulta interesante la explicación que se da aquí de la génesis del comportamiento homosexual, así como la afirmación de que éste es la conclusión necesaria de una manera de entender la sociedad que destierra la figura del varón, idealiza la de la mujer y tiene en la igualdad y la homogeneidad dos de sus principales dogmas.

Todavía hay más.

"Él es, pues, el Niño Predicador"

2008-07-14T04:27:00.002-04:00

Hay niños predicadores en todo el mundo, y la historia de Nezareth Casti Rey también es fascinante por ser igual a otras. En el conjunto está la peculiaridad: algo está ocurriendo, creen los evangélicos, quienes adoctrinan a los niños en su religión, los instruyen en la Biblia y no hay nada extraordinario ni milagroso en ello. Es casi un acto de sobrevivencia frente a otras religiones más antiguas y poderosas y gobernadas por adultos: un niño evangélico puede garantizar la continuidad de su religión, que está en franco ascenso demográfico, y a los cinco años de edad ya es capaz de hablar de Dios con la misma naturalidad con la que pide chocolates.

En Brasil, Ana Carolina Dias es una niña que predica desde los dos años. La pastora más pequeña del mundo, le han dicho, y se cree que sana enfermedades incurables, entre ellas el sida. En el mismo país, Marcos Ferreira do Santos, de dieciséis años, expulsa demonios desde que tenía cinco. En Panamá, los hermanos Dailyn y Kevin Patiño predican desde los dos y tres años de edad. Son hijos de un pastor que, cuando sus niños predicaron por primera vez, dijo: "El Espíritu Santo dirigió todo". En Estados Unidos, es famoso el caso del niño Terry Durham, The Little Man of God, quien no sólo predica, sino que lo hace con un ritmo gospel que incita al baile. En Lima, Perú, donde hay más de tres millones de evangélicos, hubo en el 2007 un Festival Evangélico de Niños Predicadores al que asistieron seis mil niños. Un año antes, en Ecuador, las iglesias evangélicas informaron que contaban con noventa y ocho niños predicadores. Ahora, camino a Paiján, el Niño Predicador, Nezareth Casti Rey, dice que tiene dos corbatas sin prendedor. La que tiene puesta y otra más clara.

Daniel Titinger, director de Etiqueta Negra, en Babelia.

Sex and the Temple

2008-07-08T12:47:00.002-04:00

Or consider these descriptions of the female orgasm: "waves of pleasure flow[ing] over me ... like sliding down a mountain waterfall ... like having a million tiny pleasure balloons explode inside of me all at once." Erica Jong and Xaviera Hollander? Try evangelical sexologists Linda Dillow and Lorraine Pintus. (Even their names are suggestive.) Far from scorning the pleasures of the flesh, evangelical and marriage experts -- recognizing, in Herzog's wry phrase, that "repression alone is not sufficiently appealing" -- have made their careers by hymning the joys of strictly marital sex.

"We think the G-spot should be seen as one more way God gave us to share in the pleasure of sex," announced the Revs. Paul and Lori Byerly, hosts of the online site the Marriage Bed. Evangelicals Melissa and Louis McBurney have endorsed oral sex, mutual masturbation and rear-entry vaginal penetration -- between spouses. The Rev. Charles Shedd has declared that he and his wife, Martha, like anal sex just fine. As Herzog notes, these sex-positive Christians have absorbed from the women's movement of the 1970s and 1980s "an interest in intensifying women's sexual pleasure," as well as "the frustration at male fascination with pornography and emotional nonpresence during sex." The result is a kind of "Christian porn," as sexperts guide their married readers toward the holy land of "soulgasm," where spirit and flesh come ecstatically together. If you follow the rules, Herzog writes, "magnificent sex will be yours forever."

Ah, yes, the rules. A Christian wife, if she wants to keep her husband's mind off porn and his hand off his own penis (onanism is still a big no-no), will have to be a 24/7 tootsie. She is advised to wear sexy lingerie and to keep her legs shaved and her nether region douched at all times. ("Wives," as Jack Jones once crooned, "should always be lovers, too.") And she has to give it up whenever her man comes calling. The example of a woman named "Ellen" is approvingly cited. "[My husband's] purity is extremely important to me, so I try to meet his needs so that he goes out each day with his cup full. During the earlier years, with much energy going into childcare and with my monthly cycle, it was a lot more difficult for me to do that. There weren't too many 'ideal times' when everything was just right. But that's life, and I did it anyway."

These naughty, really sick evangelicals...

Auditioning for "GB for Jesus"

2008-07-02T11:51:00.006-04:00

"I don't even want to talk about that," Montag says. "There were rumors about a sex tape, but I had nothing to do with that. God knows the truth in all of this, and at the end of the day, that is the only thing that matters. Jesus was persecuted, and I'm going to get persecuted, ya know? But it doesn't matter to me."

Little coverage in celebrity magazines, which seem to chronicle every movement of this reality troupe, is given to Montag's and Pratt's Christianity. Montag identifies herself as "kind of non-denominational Baptist" and hopes to release a Christian album one day. Both she and Pratt read the Bible conscientiously. Montag even planned on devoting her life to God as a missionary in Africa.

"I have been the most religious person since I was 2 years old. I always felt this crazy connection to God," says Montag, who grew up in Colorado with Holly, brother Sky, 15, and her since-divorced parents, Bill, a rancher, and Darlene, who runs a restaurant with Montag's stepfather.

This August, she and Pratt are headed to Africa to "feed children and help build things." Cameras will capture their trek, but not for The Hills. Pratt says it's possible they could adopt a baby while over there, but Montag laughs that idea off.

Life imitates art, life imitates art...

Now everybody--.

Europeans are from Mars, American are from Venus (yeah, in that order)

2008-07-01T08:35:00.001-04:00

Why is that?

Because Europe doesn't have a robust fundamentalist subculture like America has had since the early parts of the 20th century. American religion has been characterized by an entrepreneurial spirit. In Europe, many of the great religious traditions wasted away because they were supported by government. They didn't need to be popular and have lots of people coming to worship on Sunday to continue. So they atrophied and people lost interest.

In America, without that kind of governmental support, religious leaders had to be entrepreneurial. So a charismatic evangelist can come up with a brand-new approach to faith and touch some chord contemporary with people's needs. It's why we see people like Rick Warren, a very popular guy who is revolutionizing the way a lot of evangelicals think about their faith. He's obviously tapped into an anti-evolutionary fundamentalism and biblical literalism that people find important and like.

Biblical literalism is very simple. You read the Bible in English and you say to yourself that these are the things God wrote down through a secretary a long time ago, and all I need to do is read this in English and that's all the work I have to do to understand it. Who wouldn't want that to be the case? If you try to tell these people that they need some egghead scholar from Harvard, who can read Hebrew, to come in and help them with it, that seems offensive and alienating, and people aren't attracted to that. So I think the ability of American religion to invent itself and to appeal to common denominators, sometimes the lowest denominator, has allowed these evangelical movements to flourish with their own agendas.

Salon.

Danger Cohabitation!

2008-07-01T03:13:00.003-04:00

Typically in cohabitation the two individuals are more concerned on obtaining satisfaction from the other person, they write. In marriage, by contrast, spouses tend to focus more on giving satisfaction to the other person.

One major problem with cohabitation, the book explains, is that the two partners often start living together for very different motives. While many women look upon it as a stepping-stone to marriage, men often look at it for convenience, and not as a firm commitment.

Unfair

Furthermore, the authors cite studies showing that typically cohabitation is not a fifty-fifty division of expenses and burdens. Women tend to contribute more, both in terms of money and in domestic work.

Y esto último nunca jamás ocurre en el matrimonio. Zenit viene a demostrar que sin papeles todo es peligro, y que una alianza es más poderosa que el mismito anillo de Frodo. Sí, Frodo.

Y yo que con esto de vivir peligrosamente me pongo a pensar en Taco Bells en llamas... Kiko me perdone.

El gran hermano Franck, el gran hermano Michel, etc

2008-06-30T14:19:00.002-04:00

In each five-minute episode, viewers follow Father Franck Ruffiot, 30, as he prays, takes to the confessional box, cooks or visits friends.

Two older priests, Father Michel and Father Christophe, are also seen jogging or celebrating a Christening.

The music and credits are taken directly from a show like Star Academy, except that the show's trademark star has been replaced by a crucifix. However, nobody is eliminated and there is no jury.

¿Sin eliminaciones ni puñaladas ni nada por el estilo? Un aburrimiento, que quieren que les diga, un puritito aburrimiento.

La respuesta es, siempre, 7:15

2008-06-30T12:49:00.000-04:00

Y si no, vean y jueguen, vean y jueguen.