A particular warning for us bloggers.

Ancient Path Seminar Coming To Ottawa.  Apr.19-21, St. Ignatius Church. Contact Edna for more details.

…on the run for the “crime” of educating their children in their own home.

The attack on the family is in full throttle.  Don’t mess with the Socialist State.

 Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus. -Rev.12:17

Tasha Kheiriddin of the National Post wrote a great article on the cost of day care for your child. Most people advocating for day care (or “Early Childhood Education”, as they call it) cite studies claiming that kids in day care learn more skills that will eventually be building blocks in their future jobs. This may in fact be true, because day care often has teaching sessions, almost like kindergarten, where kids are taught certain things. But even those benefits are being challenged by new research, as Ms. Kheiriddin explains. Moreover, the day care advocates ignore what is sacrificed in the process. Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve heard a lot of bad things about the education curriculum in Québec. I knew that they were normalizing homosexuality (who isn’t these days?) but now I hear that they’re avid practitioners of gender mainstreaming on the minds of our kids.

Get a load of this picture, which is taken from a school book for students in their second year of high school. For those of you that don’t read French, the first question asks the student to indicate his/her gender. The choices are:

• Boy
• Girl
• I don’t know yet

If kids don’t know their gender by the time they’re 12 years old, they need to be told. They need help. They need support and guidance. They most certainly don’t need the State telling them that they can choose their gender or switch it around from one week to the next.

This is child abuse, pure and simple.

Opposition to this crap is mounting, so the Left is pulling out the coercion tactics. A Québec mother has recently received death threats for expressing her opposition to this sex-confusion agenda.

France apparently has adopted a similar program of gender mainstreaming. But the French are stirring the pot and unhappy with the arrangement. Despite their reputation for being “progressive”, the French also have some common sense left, more so than Quebeckers, it would appear.

Pray for our children!

Socon or Bust is always happy to provide you with useful information to help you and your families live healthy and wholesome lifestyles. Today I bring you an important warning about compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs).

Most of you probably have at least one CFL at home. They are appealing because they use much less energy, thus protecting the environment and saving us money.

Most of you are probably aware that CFLs contain mercury. But I suspect that few of you are aware of the extraordinary health precautions you must take if ever a CFL breaks in your house. What you’re about to read might shock you so much that you’ll want to rid your home of all CFLs for the safety of your family.  Read the rest of this entry »

I agree with Mark on many points in his analysis.  And he’s right on about it being about relationships.

I’ve recently been on both sides of this divide, in my personal life.  On one occasion, I called the bull and suffered terribly because of it for over a year and probably for much longer for “righteousness sake”.  On the other occasion, I did what McQueary did and punted (and no it’s not sex related).

Feel crappy about it too.

Either way, it’s not pleasant because even if you’re “brave”, you keep second guessing yourself if you did the right thing, considering the fallout to your relationship with that person.  I don’t feel at all comfortable with the continued judgements placed on McQueary and Paterno.  Sure, they fell short. Sure, they should bear the responsibility.  But they’re sinners like the rest of us…and also worthy of redemption too.

In the blogging world here at Socon or Bust, readers will take note that we’ve been pretty harsh and condemnatory against D&P and the Bishops’ actions and positions regarding the abortion scandal. But it was not originally like that at all.  We asked politely for the bishops and D&P to address the evidence.  But they didn’t do it.  They became obstinate in their positions and the rest is sordid history.

Everyone makes mistakes and Catholics are bound to forgive.  If D&P and the Bishops had acted like Christian gentlemen when they were busted, everything would have been fine.  We’d kiss and make up, have a beer together and move on with life.  But that’s not what happened.  There’s a difference in how one treats someone who admits they were wrong and someone who doesn’t admit they were wrong.

It is wrong to keep hammering on something when that person made a mistake.  But it’s not wrong (and indeed becomes an moral obligation) to keep criticizing when someone refuses to admit they made a mistake.

Big difference between the two.

Good advice for all of us fathers out there.

You don’t want to miss seeing this – after you do, I can assure you that you will want to forward it to all your friends. 

Garvan was born with a rare disease that made him stop growing at age 5. He passed away at age 12, but not before leaving behind a video that will really touch you. He was a warrior for Christ with unshakable faith.  Such wisdom at such a young age – unbelievable.

Scary.

OTTAWA – Throughout the developed world, lowered birth rates and family breakdown will have a devastating effect on the global economy and the welfare state’s viability, says an international study released Oct 3.

“On current trends, we face a world of rapidly aging and declining populations, of few children — many of them without the benefit of siblings and a stable, two-parent home — of lonely seniors living on meagre public support, of cultural and economic stagnation,” says the study, entitled “The Empty Cradle: How Contemporary Trends Undermine the Global Economy.”

…. 

(Source)

I have always said (in fact, I said it today to a business colleague) that the greatest epidemic approaching our society is loneliness.  Such terrible, cold loneliness which the culture of death has produced.

No strong relationship with their kids or no kids or no grandchildren  —>  Lonely, old people.

Sad. 

That’s why I keep running in these elections:  the culture of life and the civilization of love are the only way to go on so many levels, but people refuse to listen because they prefer stimulation to responsibility.

 “Children do not derive their psychosocial and emotional well-being from legal rights granted to them by the state.  Rather, a child’s well-being is optimally nurtured within a stable family setting with parents who are loving, affirming, protective, directive, and committed to one another. It is true that the state can augment such a setting, but well-being must first begin within the home.” (American Academy of Pediatrics)

Must see film for men.

In Ottawa, SiverCity in Gloucester is showing it.

Fathers!  Listen to the message:  step up and answer the call.

Go and watch it.  Support Christian films hitting the mainstream.

As a follow-up to yesterday’s story on birth defects, here’s another problem with IVF:

A University of Toronto geneticist is calling for more study of a link between fertility treatment and certain rare genetic disorders, noting that babies born after treatment are up to 10 times more likely to suffer from the conditions — one of which causes serious mental disability. And that is likely just the tip of the iceberg, Dr. Rosanna Weksberg said after addressing Canada’s fertility-medicine community recently.

Dr. Weksberg said she supports in-vitro fertilization and other reproductive-technology procedures, with the “wonderful” benefits they usually bring families, but noted that she is already seeing many fertilitytreatment offspring with one of the conditions show up in her genetics clinic.

Called Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome, causing symptoms such as unevenly sized limbs, an enlarged tongue and a high risk of kidney tumours, it occurs in one of every 1,300 such children, compared to one in 13,000 in the general population.

Read the rest of this entry »