Mark Houck acquitted:
A jury has reportedly acquitted Pennsylvania pro-life activist who was accused of allegedly pushing a Planned Parenthood escort during a clash outside an abortion clinic, Life News reported.
Mark Houck, 48, faced charges that he violated the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, which makes it a federal crime to use force with the intent to injure, intimidate and interfere with anyone because that person produces reproductive health care. He pleaded not guilty.
A serious question:
Maternal overvaluation was particularly correlated with grandiose narcissism. Paternal overvaluation, on the other hand, was associated with grandiose narcissism only when participants reported less caring, more lenient fathers. Greater caring from fathers accompanied by firmer limits appears to protect against the grandiosity-promoting influence of overvaluation from fathers.
Whereas paternal leniency was partially associated with grandiose narcissism, maternal leniency was associated with vulnerable narcissism. Vulnerable narcissism was also associated with maternal abuse and neglect.
Paternal abuse and neglect did not play a large role in this sample, beyond the protective effect of caring fathering in limiting grandiosity...
LCMS getting subverted:
God has not given us a flowchart determining how we each should live. And so, every age of Christians will also have to use the wisdom God has given them to discern how best to follow His Word. Those who do this well will apply Scripture and sound doctrine to their lives and their culture. Those who do this poorly will instead apply their own lives and culture to Scripture and sound doctrine, baptizing that which should be under judgment.
The former US astronaut Buzz Aldrin has got married for the fourth time on his 93rd birthday.
Mr Aldrin was one of the pilots on the legendary Apollo 11 spaceflight in 1969, becoming one of the first two people to walk on the moon after the mission's commander, Neil Armstrong.
The former pilot said that he and new wife Anca Faur were as "excited as eloping teenagers"...
"On my 93rd birthday and the day I will be honoured by Living Legends of Aviation I am pleased to announce that my long-time love Dr Anca Faur and I have tied the knot," he tweeted.
Dr Faur, 63, who has a PhD in chemical engineering, is the executive vice president of Mr Aldrin's company, Buzz Aldrin Ventures.
I should say they both look younger than their age:
It will be really funny if they announce she is expecting soon:)
The real question is though did he actually walk on the moon? As in did they land on the moon at all?
even in Europe:
>Swiss OnlyFans star Melba Monti says that her choice of career makes it hard to live in a small town.
Melba, who lives in the southern Swiss town of Locarno, complains that everywhere she goes in her neighbourhood, people shout “Hey,OnlyFans!”
In some cases, she says, she is faced with “aggressive outbursts” as a result of her career choice. Melba says she rarely leaves her apartment because of the harassment she gets in the street.
I'm not sure in which degree recent Covid vaccines contribute to it (if at all), but here is a 2019 article about an increase in heart attacks among young adults:
...these events are steadily rising in very young adults. New data not only validate this trend but also reveal that more heart attacks are striking those under age 40...
The study, which is the first to compare young (41-50 years old) to very young (40 or younger) heart attack survivors, found that among patients who suffer a heart attack at a young age overall, 1 in 5 is 40 or younger. Moreover, during the 16-year study period (2000 to 2016), the proportion of very young people having a heart attack has been increasing, rising by 2 percent each year for the last 10 years.
"It used to be incredibly rare to see anyone under age 40 come in with a heart attack—and some of these people are now in their 20s and early 30s," said Ron Blankstein, MD, a preventive cardiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, associate professor at Harvard Medical School in Boston and the study's senior author.
Besides "traditional" risk factors such as diabetes and high cholesterol, younger patients also reported drug abuse:
However, the youngest patients were more likely to report substance abuse, including marijuana and cocaine (17.9 percent vs. 9.3 percent, respectively), but had less alcohol use.
So here you have it: smoking dope is not only degenerate, it will also give you a heart attack at the age of 25. While moderate alcohol use, on the other hand, does appear to be somewhat protective. Reject modernity, embrace tradition:)
It's easy to understand if you have followed a couple of internet/twitter discussions on modern issues plaguing society.
Like today there was a discussion of Only Fans. People who claim to be conservative Catholics and freely admit that it damages society and promotes degeneracy, turn around a second later and state that it shouldn't be forbidden because muh government is bad stuff. Conservatism is the philosophy of failure at this point. Not only they haven't conserved anything, whenever they get some power, they refuse to use it.
A lot of what passes as conservatism nowadays has a libertarian background. They keep talking about free market as a solution to all of the society's problems. It doesn't work this way because market is not about morality, it's about trade. Morals of a society depend on laws, not on the market. When the laws guarding marriage became abolished or changed, the institution got considerably weakened. It's the same with other things as well.
Someone once said that conservatives love Lord Of The Rings because it perfectly illustrates their own point of view that wielding power is immoral. Hence the good guys turn down the Ring of Power which in itself is pure evil.
I tend to agree with that person. Christians should reject libertarian morality (do as thou will shall be the whole of the law) and whenever possible, strive for laws based on the Scriptures which would absolutely include prohibition/criminalisation of certain things the way it used to be in the past.
One of the things that Europeans and Westerners consider the most shocking about Muslim countries is the fact that they often punish adultery quite harshly, including death penalty. Somehow we are taught to think that it's misogyny and oppression of women even though men are punished, too.
Few of modern Christians appear to be aware of the fact that the Scriptures agree with Islam on this matter:
Lev20:10
And the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
Notice how adultery is defined. Adultery is not a married man visiting prostitutes (that would be fornication), it's specifically a married woman lying with another man.
Every culture on Earth used to have punishments for adultery including heathens like Greeks and Romans. At the very least it was divorce, in some cases the law allowed the husband/father to kill the lovers.
Early Christian Church allowed civil punishments for adultery, as witnessed by early English law, for instance:
Clause 31, for example, reads "if a freeman lies with [another] free-man's wife, he shall pay [the husband] his wergeld and procure a second wife with his own money, and bring her to the other man's home".[3]: 206 The ninth-century Laws of Alfred of Wessex include similar provisions, including an explicit statement that it was legal for one man to attack another "if he finds another with his wedded wife, behind closed doors or under the same blanket; or [if he finds another man] with his legitimate daughter (or with his legitimate married sister); or with his mother, if she has been legally married to his father".[3]: 208
It also included the mutilation of adulterous women:
...the code specified fines in the case of an adulterous husband, or
religious penance in cases viewed as minor (adultery with a slave), but
also prescribed corporal mutilation for female adulterers—cutting off
their nose and ears—as well as the forfeiture of all the woman's
property to her husband.
Later, however, it changed as the prosecution for adultery shifted from secular authorities to the Church and common law which was established around 12th century didn't see adultery as a crime. And here, I believe something very important happened in Christian West. Adultery, a crime so heinous that the Bible calls for death penalty for it, essentially became legalised. Men, in some cases, still could kill the guy who seduced the wife, but women were simply let off.
Predictably, that led to the lower morals overall, and it was, I believe, one of the reasons for Reformation. Here is What J. Calvin wrote on the matter:
11. Neither do I condemn thee. We are not told that Christ
absolutely acquitted the woman, but that he allowed her to go at
liberty. Nor is this wonderful, for he did not wish to undertake any
thing that did not belong to his office. He bad been sent by the Father
to gather the lost sheep, (Matthew 10:6)
and, therefore, mindful of his calling, he exhorts the woman to
repentance, and comforts her by a promise of grace. They who infer from
this that adultery ought not to be punished with death, must, for the
same reason, admit that inheritances ought not to be divided, because
Christ refused to arbitrate in that matter between two brothers, (Luke 12:13.)
Indeed, there will be no crime whatever that shall not be exempted from
the penalties of the law, if adultery be not punished; for then the
door will be thrown open for any kind of treachery, and for poisoning,
and murder, and robbery...
Yet the Popish theology is, that in this passage Christ has brought to us the Law of grace, by which adulterers are freed from punishment. And though they endeavor, by every method, to efface from the minds of men the grace of God, such grace as is every where declared to us by the doctrine of the Gospel, yet in this passage alone they preach aloud the Law of grace... But let us remember that, while Christ forgives the sins of men, he does not overturn political order, or reverse the sentences and punishments appointed by the laws.
I should add that Catholic Church strictly forbade divorce and annulment was practically impossible to get in that period so that the cuckolded husband had to basically s**k it up and accept any bastard into the family. Eastern Orthodox churches, on the other hand, always allowed divorce as a punishment for adultery and guilty party was prohibited from remarriage. That became the case in Protestant countries though harsher punishments sometimes were used:
Adultery was outlawed in secular statute law briefly under the Commonwealth of England in the 1650s. Following a long series of attempts to legislate against adultery in Parliament which failed to win the vote, the Rump Parliament passed the Commonwealth (Adultery) Act in May 1650, inter alia imposing the death penalty for adultery, that was defined as sexual intercourse between a married woman and a man other than her husband. Both partners would be liable for death sentence in such case. If a man (married or unmarried) had sex with an unmarried woman (including widow), that would be fornication, punishable only by three months for first offenders (applicable to both partners).
Funny enough, after Restoration the 1st thing which happened was the legalisation of adultery yet again. Somehow, European aristocracy really enjoyed sharing each other's wives:
However, like all legislation passed by the Commonwealth, the act was repealed following the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660.[6][5]: 205 [3]: 225
Yet, the legacy of that period was such that it became possible to sue adulterers in a civil court:
A more lasting change during the early modern period was that it became possible to prosecute for adultery in English common law due to developments in the common-law concept of loss of consortium, which made it possible for a cuckold to bring a civil case against an adulterer under tort law.[3]: 216–21 'Consortium' in this context means "(the right of) association and fellowship between two married people";[7] 'loss of consortium' was an act that deprived one spouse (initially only the husband) of the services which the other spouse was expected to provide. In the 1619 case Guy v. Livesey, it is clear that precedent had been established by that time that exclusive access to sexual services was considered to fall within the concept of 'consortium', and that an adulterer might therefore be prosecuted for depriving a cuckold of exclusive access to the sexual services of his wife.
Law did expect married women to put out at that time. Predictably, it was finally abolished in 1970 when feminism won a decisive victory.
In the USA, originally, adultery was a crime but the laws started changing in modern times. Even when those laws still exist they aren't used. In some situations in the past, the husband was basically allowed to kill an unfaithful wife and her lover caught in the act with little or no punishment and here I should add that it did often happen in predominantly Catholic countries so even though the Church was rather lenient the society wasn't:
Killing of wives due to adultery has been traditionally treated very leniently in Brazil, in court cases where husbands claimed the "legitimate defense of their honor" (legitima defesa da honra) as justification for the killing. Although this defense was not explicitly stipulated in the 20th-century Criminal Code, it has been successfully pleaded by lawyers throughout the 20th century, in particular in the countryside, though less so in the coastal big cities. In 1991 Brazil's Supreme Court explicitly rejected the "honor defense" as having no basis in Brazilian law.[31][32][33]
Prior to 1975, the French Penal Code of 1810 stated at article 324 that "in the case of adultery, provide for by article 336, murder committed upon the wife as well as upon her accomplice, at the moment when the husband shall have caught them in the fact, in the house where the husband and wife dwell, is excusable [meaning a punishment of 1 to 5 years, according to article 326].[37] In practice, however, many domestic violence crimes resulted in acquittal by the juries...
In my opinion, there should be a punishment for adultery, though not necessarily by death. If you read the Wiki link above, you'll notice how feminist organisations specifically decry any law which seeks to restrict (female) sexual activity as "misogynist".
Actually, I'll go further and say that the fact that the civil authorities in the late medieval period refused to prosecute adultery and were supported in it by the Catholic Church (probably under pressure from the elites of these times) has contributed to the widespread acceptance of feminist doctrine in the West.
Or rather, are they attractive enough for some man out there to marry?
It is an undeniable fact of life that men like younger women. Whether a man is 25 or 75, he'll like a girl of 18. 18 to 21 is physical prime for women just like 30 to 35 is the prime for men. There could be exceptions, but it's just (biological) reality.
It's also true that feminists actively try to deny it and encourage younger women to pursue education, careers and traveling well into their mid30s and even later. On the other hand, there are male internet gurus who correctly criticise this trend as based on a lie but then turn around and promote another pretty lie, namely that older men have a chance with young girls.
In reality, young women prefer young men. Realistically speaking, an average guy of 50 has zero chance with a girl of 18 or 20, unless he is wealthy, very high status etc. There are exceptions to this rule, but still. Heck, when I was 18 even guys at 30 seemed like old men to me. They were adults, I was still a teenager.
This holds true even for countries with arranged marriages:
Muslims have the widest spousal age gap (6.6 years between men and their wives or partners), followed by Hindus (5.6 years), Christians (3.8), Buddhists (2.9), the religiously unaffiliated (2.3) and Jews (2.1).
Notice that this "widest gap" is 6.6 years, not 30.
Sub-Saharan Africa has even bigger age gaps:
Large age gaps are especially common in sub-Saharan Africa, including in Gambia (14.5 years between men and their wives or partners), Guinea (13.5) and Mali (12.9).
Still not 30 or even 20 years though.
A man in his early 40s will probably find a girl of 19 much more attractive than a woman of 30, but does he realistically have any chance? Attractiveness is relative. Both men and women should ditch unrealistic expectations and get down to earth. Neither s8x should wait too long to settle down.
(Of course, it will be different for the divorced folks and widowers/widows).
Oh yes, and a woman at 30 is usually plenty fertile still. There is a reason an average menopause age is 51, not 31.
Thoughts?
Some time ago I read advice online to serve holiday meals on disposable plates to save time on washing the dishes. Some people even claimed that everyone is doing it nowadays. Personally I have never encountered it outside some big birthday parties, so I thought it an exaggeration but then I watched a YouTube video where somebody served Christmas dinner on disposable plastic plates.
I mean whatever. Is anyone really doing it? I always use my best china for this occasion. What about you?
Let's find out!
There has been an interesting study done by the University of Loma Linda which is called Vegetarian Dietary Patterns and Mortality in Adventist Health Study 2
The researchers divided all the participants into 5 categories: omnivores and 4 groups of vegetarians, namely semi-vegetarians, pescatarians, lacto-ovo vegetarians and vegans and then followed them up for 5+ years (you can read the details if you click on the link above).
Omnivores were used as a control case with their mortality at 1 and compared with the other 4 groups. An interesting pattern emerged. Among men, vegans appeared to be in the least danger of dying prematurely:
| All-Cause | Ischemic Heart Disease | Cardiovascular Disease | Cancer | Other |
|---|
| Men (n = 25 105), No. of deathsa | 1031 | 169 | 390 | 273 | 368 |
| Vegetarian | |||||
| Vegan | 0.72 (0.56–0.92) | 0.45 (0.21–0.94) | 0.58 (0.38–0.89) | 0.81 (0.48–1.36) | 0.81 (0.53–1.22) |
| Lacto-ovo | 0.86 (0.74–1.01) | 0.76 (0.52–1.12) | 0.77 (0.59–0.99) | 1.01 (0.75–1.37) | 0.89 (0.69–1.15) |
| Pesco | 0.73 (0.57–0.93) | 0.77 (0.45–1.30) | 0.66 (0.44–0.98) | 1.10 (0.73–1.67) | 0.60 (0.39–0.93) |
| Semi | 0.93 (0.68–1.26) | 0.73 (0.33–1.60) | 0.75 (0.43–1.32) | 1.15 (0.65–2.03) | 1.03 (0.62–1.71) |
| Nonvegetarian | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] |
As you can see, vegan mortality is in some cases as low as the half of that of omnivores, and that is especially the case for Ischemic Heart Disease (IHD) and Cardiovascular Disease (CVD). Pescatarians are in the 2nd place. That basically corresponds to what the doctors who are proponents of veganism are saying in their YouTube videos (Dr. Esselstyn, anyone?) And also with some testimonies I read online of men who swear by this lifestyle.
However, when we look at women, the situation is completely different:
| All-Cause | Ischemic Heart Disease | Cardiovascular Disease | Cancer | Other |
|---|
| Women (n = 48 203), No. of deathsa,c | 1529 | 203 | 597 | 433 | 499 |
| Vegetarian | |||||
| Vegan | 0.97 (0.78–1.20) | 1.39 (0.87–2.24) | 1.18 (0.88–1.60) | 0.99 (0.69–1.44) | 0.70 (0.47–1.05) |
| Lacto-ovo | 0.94 (0.83–1.07) | 0.85 (0.59–1.22) | 0.99 (0.81–1.22) | 0.85 (0.67–1.09) | 0.93 (0.75–1.17) |
| Pesco | 0.88 (0.72–1.07) | 0.51 (0.26–0.99) | 0.90 (0.66–1.23) | 0.86 (0.61–1.21) | 0.81 (0.58–1.15) |
| Semi | 0.92 (0.70–1.22) | 1.09 (0.60–1.98) | 0.93 (0.64–1.34) | 0.85 (0.56–1.30) | 0.97 (0.64–1.47) |
| Nonvegetarian | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] | 1 [Reference] |
Women not only don't have any advantages from the vegan diet, their heart disease mortality rates (both from IHD and CVD) are in some cases double that of omnivores. How comes?
Here is my theory. As we all probably know, women are protected from heart disease as long as they menstruate (especially if they aren't using hormonal birth control, but that's another topic). There is also research that demonstrates that vegetarian and especially vegan females go into menopause earlier and there are enough ex-vegan women telling all sorts of horror stories about the problems with their cycles which caused them to quit.
On the other hand, there is also research which says that red meat and refined carbs are associated with earlier menopause while oily fish and legumes delay it.
(...every additional daily portion of oily fish and legumes was linked to a delay in menopause of roughly three years...)
When we go back to our table above, we see that female pescatarians have the IHD mortality the half of omnivores. So it appears that my theory has some basis behind it.
So are vegans healthy? It depends on whether they are male or female. Apparently, men and women have different needs. While men benefit from low-fat diets, women need fat to stay fertile (and healthy) longer:
(The study team noted that the high-fiber/low-animal fat content in vegetarian meals has previously been linked to low estrogen levels.)
An ironic thing is that there are many more female than male vegans. Well, you can read these studies yourself and draw your own conclusions:)
Time to take your Christmas tree down! You can leave other decorations till Candlemas though, that is what I'm planning to do.
P.S. I should add that there is some discussion about the proper date as some say you should take the tree down on the Epiphany Eve (that would be yesterday) or the day after (tomorrow). I think I'll stick with today as I can vacuum right after:) Don't really feel like cleaning at the weekend.
A group of nearly 50 conservative heavyweights co-signed a statement Wednesday calling to "change the status quo in Washington," and applauded the 20 members of Congress who Wednesday voted against House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, sinking his bid for House speaker after six rounds of votes.
She has 6 children, too!
Plus, they both married young, she didn't pursue college education, and they stayed chaste until marriage. She also supported her husband through depression and hid her miscarriage from him when he was preparing for an important fight. Pretty traditional for modern times, don't you think so?
I have decided to allow anonymous comments again, as an experiment. However, I will forbid it if things really get out of hand.
We just came home and I'm rather tired. I'll post more tomorrow or so.
Happy New Year to all of my readers! There will be some changes to the blog, I'll announce them later this week.
Greetings and best wishes everyone!
