A reader writes:
What is the proper way to dispose of ‘worn’ or broken sacramentals?
There is nothing in canon law on this, however the following represents the relevant pious custom:
An ancient Christian church, possibly dating to the founding of Christian monasticism, has been found near the Red Sea:
"Workers from Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities found the ruins while restoring the foundations of the Apostles Church at St. Anthony’s Monastery. The remains are about 2 or 2 1/2 yards underground, said the head of the council, Zahi Hawass.
"The monastery, which is in the desert west of the Red Sea, was founded by disciples of St. Anthony, a hermit who died in A.D. 356 and is regarded as the father of Christian monasticism. A colony of hermits settled around him and he led them in a community.
"The remains include the column bases of a mud-brick church and two-room hermitages."
Stories like this remind me of an observation made by the tour-guide priest during a pilgrimage I went on to the Holy Land in the Jubilee Year 2000. He noted that visiting the Christian sites in the Holy Land is a visible testimony to the antiquity of the Church. All of the major Christian sites in the Holy Land are claimed either by the Catholic Church or by Orthodox churches whose ancient communities in the Holy Land broke off communion with the Catholic Church. On the other hand, the Protestant presence at Christian sites in the Holy Land is negligible because Protestantism didn’t enter the scene until over a millennium-and-a-half after the founding of Christianity. While this isn’t "proof" against the claims of Protestantism, it is a historical reminder that Protestantism is a Johnny-come-lately phenomenon.
Earlier we had a post on zombies.
As you may know, zombies are part of Haitian folklore. The term became popular in the U.S. following the release of the 1932 film White Zombie–starring our old friend Bela Lugosi!
This wasn’t the first time that the idea of zombies had appeared in western thought, though. The idea of reanimated bodies coming out of their graves and stalking the living had already been thunk up in the Middle Ages, when they were called "revenants" (Latin, "the returned," more or less).
Folks back then had their own ideas about how to deal with the revenant threat, which might come in handy in case of an actual zombie uprising.
(NOTE: To the extent that there is any basis for these European legends, my guess is that they’re based on people who were buried when they weren’t actually dead yet–not an unknown occurrence in the old days–who then revived temporarily in a disoriented state, poor souls.)
A reader writes:
I watched ‘Land of the Dead’ on Friday night, and on the way home had some thoughts about zombies.
Do zombies have souls? The most obvious theological position for us to take with zombies seems to be that they are the bodies of humans reanimated by some principle other than the [separated at death] soul. Of course, we can’t prove this conclusively, but it’s convenient for us to assume they lack souls because it makes it easy, ethically, for us to kill them.
The problem we have is figuring out what a zombie actually is. There may be some real-life basis to the zombie legend. There are claims that certain psychoactive compounds or mental illnesses may be at the basis of it.
On the other hand, zombies are extensively treated in fiction, where numerous causes are used to explain them.
Basically, though, it seems that the possible natures of zombies can be grouped into just a few categories:
Which of these explanations is the correct one in the case of a particular zombie or zombie invasion that you may be facing is crucial for making the correct moral response. The basic divide is between options 1 & 2 on the one hand and optiosn 3 & 4 on the other.
If (1) is the case then they are humans and so have to be treated as such (see below).
If (2) is the case then their status is ambiguous enough that one should err on the side of treating them as humans. They may not have a human soul, but they do have a rational soul and until we learn otherwise we must treat rational souls (e.g., the kind aliens have) as having rights equivalent to ours. (Note well: For this option to occur it isn’t sufficient that a rational soul animate the body in a merely temporary or qualified fashion. It would have to have to animate the body the same way souls normally animate bodies. If it is a spirit merely telekinetically controlling the body without becoming its animating force so that it becomes a living body then option (4) is triggered.)
If (3) is the case then zombies can be treated as animals (see below).
If (4) is the case then zombies can be treated as robots (see below).
Given the assumption that they don’t have souls, then there’d be no problem with "killing" them.
True. Meaning: if options (4) is the case then we can kill them with no problem. Lock and load.
If, on the other hand, we assumed charitably that they did have souls, we’d be obliged to at least attempt to find other means to deal with them.
Not necessarily. They might have non-rational souls (option 3), in which case they could be treated as animals. While one would not want to be unnecessarily cruel to a zombie any more than one would want to be unnecessarily cruel to an animal, this would not preclude killing them. When faced with an animal attack or a zombie attack, use of lethal force would clearly be warranted.
Unless, of course, we take into account a seemingly implacable hostility to living humans. It could be argued that our legitimate concerns for self-defence as individuals or as a society could justify killing zombies.
Bingo! Their implacable hostility toward our race makes the filmland version of the zombie a legitimate subject of self-defense killing, even if options (1) or (2) are the case in a particular instance.
The problem would be to house zombies in such a way as to ensure the safety of the general population. Something like a maximum security prison.
I’m thinking that this proposal is ill-advised and would be likely to result in future zombie attacks. If there were some hope of curing the zombie–as might be the case in option (1)–then we would want to do all we could for them, including humanely housing (institutionalizing) the zombie population, but if we are talking a typical, incurable brain-munching zombie then, well, sticking them in prison is the stuff that sequels are made of.
It’d be more merciful to them and safer for us to simply exterminate them if zombie movies are any indication.
There are other problems than physical restraint to consider, given that their sustenance seems to be human flesh. Obviously we couldn’t provide that … or could we? If organ donation is allowable, would people be able to "donate" their bodies to feeding zombies, if all other attempts to find alternated food sources failed? There are practical problems with this: if there are a lot of zombies, it would be hard to find sufficient donors (if you can find any donors at all).
Well, if zombies were able only to eat human flesh (why this would be, I couldn’t say, but let’s go with it per suppositum) then it would be theoretically possible to donate non-vital human flesh (i.e., organs that you don’t require to live or the flesh of recently deceased humans) but this would seem to be ill-advised for several reasons, not least among them allowing zombies to survive. It would be analogous using human material to deliberately culture a virus that might one day burst forth to kill again.
What if someone is bitten by a zombie? People who are bitten die and become zombies themselves.
In some zombie stories, yes.
In Land of the Dead this frequently meant that they either committed suicide [to avoid becoming a zombie] or were killed by their friends. Obviously in Catholic theology we couldn’t allow this,
Correct. You can’t kill a person (or yourself) to keep them from becoming a zombie. There is another solution, however . . .
and we would be obliged to provide palliative care for bitten individuals to the best of our ability up to the point of death, and then immediately take measures to prevent zombification, i.e. destroy the brain.
Bingo. Wait until the person is either no longer alive and prevent their transformation or, failing that, kill them as soon as they have become a zombie and are now an enemy of mankind.
Incidentally, the same reasoning as above applies to vampires and other forms of undead.
If you’re interested in learning more about the real-world implications of a zombie attack, you might want to
GET THE BOOK "THE ZOMBIE SURVIVAL GUIDE: COMPLETE PROTECTION FROM THE UNDEAD"
though I haven’t read it myself.
You might also want to
STARTING CAPTIONS:
A reader writes:
I’m an artist (hip hop), and part of the "tradition" of making good beats is
sampling from other records. Technically, this is illegal without
permission.
Apparently so. I was surprised, thinking that fair use might be a defense for very small bits of music–and it might still be–but
HERE’S A LAWYER SAYING THAT FAIR USE IS NOT A DEFENSE IN SUCH CASES.
Obviously, sometimes the spirit of the law outweighs the letter. For
example, nobody concerns themselves with crossing the street at the
crosswalk, even though it’s illegal not to do so. The spirit of the law is
safety, and so long as you follow it, it’s no sin.Can I apply this same principle to sampling?
Potentially, but with some significant qualifiers that I’ll get into in a minute.
Theft is defined as the use of someone else’s property against the reasonable will of the owner, and I can imagine uses of short samples of music that would be so insignificant from an economic point of view that they would not be contrary to the reasonable will of the copyright holder (meaning: it would be unreasonable for the copyright holder to object).
For example, if you were making songs purely for your own entertainment and not distributing them, this would likely not be contrary to the reasonable will of the copyright holder any more than it would be for me to make a collage of pictures and passages I had snipped out of books or magazines, provided I don’t start distributing such collages. (There are other examples, but I wanted to pick a clear one, and it’s clearer if you aren’t distributing such works than if you are.)
The spirit of the sampling law
is to protect commercial profit off of someone else’s work.
True.
My music,
however, is done for God and the Church. What money I make from it, I give
to charity or I use it to make more music.
That doesn’t do anything to overturn the copyright holder’s right to remuneration, though. It may mean that you are not making money, but it doesn’t give them the money that they would be paid if you obtained permission to do this legally. They’re still out money that the law says is due to them.
I’m not distributing to millions
of people.
This means that the amount of money that the copyright holder is due will be smaller, but they’re still out money that the law says they’re due if you don’t pay it.
Since it’s not intrinsically immoral to sample, is it morally
licit for me to use small samples in my beats? It would be another matter if
I were making entire songs or records available, but these are just small
samples incorporated into the beat.
Prescing from the question of the prudence of the matter (in which you have to reckon the likelihood of getting sued and having to pay huge sums of money that you may not have) and considering the matter strictly morally, it seems to me that you might be able to morally justify sampling if you were doing it for your own entertainment and performing for others in non-commercial (nobody pays money) venues.
But if you are distributing copies (for money or not) or selling copies (even small numbers of copies or for small fees), I would suggest that you do one of the following things:
Hope this helps!
A reader writes:
Is it wrong or sinful to copy music if it is legal to do so?
In Canada, right around the birth of MP3 and affordable CD burners, the music industry (Canadian and US companies) lobbied the government incessantly about pirating. They wanted Canada to put a tax on all recordable media especially blank CD’s that would be shared among artists and studios. Anyway, the government eventually caved and now there is a tax on tapes, blank CD’s, and even MP3 players regardless of whether you intend to use them for copied music or not.
In exchange for the tax, the law allows for Canadians to make copies of music for personal use. The only restriction is that you must copy the music yourself (i.e. your friend cannot make a copy and give it to you). There is doubt on whether downloading the music with p2p file sharing clients fits under that law. Yesterday the courts ruled that it is allowable under that law but there are going to be plenty appeals by music companies. Some legislators are planning on introducing legislation to disallow p2p downloading of copyright materials but for now its legal.
So what would be the Church’s view on this? Would there be a difference between physically copying a CD vs downloading a file in given that the former is clearly legal and the later is ambiguously legal?
Here’s are a few supporting links: Yesterday’s Ruling, Copyright Board of Canada
The ultimate standard of right and wrong is the divine law, but the divine law often contains principles that much be given more concrete form in particular situations by human legislators. Thus, for example, the divine law would require that, if one drives an automobile, one must drive it safely (apart from emergency circumstances). It is not determined by the divine law, however, whether one should drive the car on the right or the left side of the road.
Given the way many streets and highways work–and the way human being work–it will be necessary to adopt a policy of either driving on the right or the left for safety reasons, but God doesn’t determine a single policy that all much follow on this point. Instead, it is left up to human legislators to give give the requirement of safe driving more concrete form by determining, in a particular region, whether driving or the left or the right will be required.
Once the legislators have determined that, we are bound by it and–correspondingly–liberated by it. In other words, if they decide that motorists are to drive on the right hand side of the road then when we are in their domain we are bound not to drive on the left hand side of the road but (unless something else intervenes to affect the situation) we are at liberty to drive on the right.
Something similar pertains to music copying. There are basic principles regarding economics, labor, and property embedded in the divine law, but the particular form in which these are to be cashed out (no pun intended) in a paricular society are left to human legislators to determine.
Once they’ve done that in your society, however, you are both bound and freed by what they do. You are bound not to violate the law but also free to take advantage of the liberty it affords.
Thus if Canada (or some other country) rules that a particular form of music copying is legal then it should be regarded as morally permissible–until the contrary is proven.
It is possible for human legislators to so badly botch their job that they make laws which are fundamentally unjust. In these cases one would (at least theoretically) have moral liberty to exceed what the laws allows one to do. Conversely, one might not be morally free to take advantage of what the law allows you to do.
However, there is a moral presumption in favor of the law. If you want to argue that a particular act of a human legislature is unjust, the burden of proof will be on you.
This is going to be very difficult to do in the case of laws relating to electronic copying of music. The whole subject of copyright law is slippery enough and liable to change due to technological innovation that I don’t see a clear argument that it is unjust toward copyright holders and thus that one would be morally bound to refrain from exercising the liberty that copyright law affords one.
Until such an argument emerges, it seems to me that one is within one’s moral rights to avail oneself of the liberty that copyright law permits one. Thus if Canada allows music copying in particular circumstances such as the ones you mention, I don’t see why you can’t do it.
The law you mention regarding personal copying of CDs, tapes, etc., seems settled, and so if I were a Canadian then I wouldn’t have a problem doing that.
If Canadian law regarding peer-to-peer copying is more tentative then it would seem to me that you would be within your moral rights to act on the law as you presently understand it, in keeping with the virtue of prudence.
Thus if it appears that the law would allow you to do p2p copying then you could go ahead and do so unless you foresee a substantial chance that the law will be reversed and that you will be sued for having done the copying during the period when the law was unclear. (The latter doesn’t seem that likely to me, but then what do I know about Canadian law?)
Hope this helps!
In what may be the premiere case of trying to have cake and eat it, too, Hollywood wants to both film Dan Brown’s trashy anti-Christian novel The DaVinci Code and market it to Christians as a Christian-friendly film:
"Filming is not yet complete on Ron Howard’s adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, but the controversy is already raging. An association called the American Society for the Defence of Tradition, Family and Property has called on Roman Catholics to boycott the film, saying: ‘It attacks everything that Catholics hold sacred.’
"They have the backing of the Archbishop of Genoa, who described the book as ‘a sackful of lies against the church and against Christ himself.’ And even enlightened Catholics [unlike, presumably, the Archbishop of Genoa?] such as the commentator Barbara Nicolosi, who runs Act One, a seminar for Christian film-makers in Hollywood, says: ‘The book is particularly repulsive. It says Jesus isn’t Divine and that the Church is basically evil.’
"Normally, such outrage would be all good clean fun at the box-office, but the re-election of George W. Bush on a wave of devout heartland votes and the phenomenal success of The Passion of the Christ have changed Hollywood’s thinking. The Christian moviegoer is now a recognised and lucrative demographic that Hollywood cannot afford to ignore.
"Columbia Studios, which is making The Da Vinci Code, clearly feels that it cannot count on divine protection [and should count itself fortunate not to be the target of divine wrath]. It has called on the services of Grace Hill Media to help to prepare the groundwork for the film, which is to be released next summer, and defuse controversy."
In a backhanded way, this whole plot substantiates the Christian assertion that Dan Brown’s novel is anti-Christian. There would be no need to spin the film as "Christian-friendly" were Hollywood unconcerned that the movie was offensive to Christian sensibilities.
In what may be the premiere case of trying to have cake and eat it, too, Hollywood wants to both film Dan Brown’s trashy anti-Christian novel The DaVinci Code and market it to Christians as a Christian-friendly film:
"Filming is not yet complete on Ron Howard’s adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, but the controversy is already raging. An association called the American Society for the Defence of Tradition, Family and Property has called on Roman Catholics to boycott the film, saying: ‘It attacks everything that Catholics hold sacred.’
"They have the backing of the Archbishop of Genoa, who described the book as ‘a sackful of lies against the church and against Christ himself.’ And even enlightened Catholics [unlike, presumably, the Archbishop of Genoa?] such as the commentator Barbara Nicolosi, who runs Act One, a seminar for Christian film-makers in Hollywood, says: ‘The book is particularly repulsive. It says Jesus isn’t Divine and that the Church is basically evil.’
"Normally, such outrage would be all good clean fun at the box-office, but the re-election of George W. Bush on a wave of devout heartland votes and the phenomenal success of The Passion of the Christ have changed Hollywood’s thinking. The Christian moviegoer is now a recognised and lucrative demographic that Hollywood cannot afford to ignore.
"Columbia Studios, which is making The Da Vinci Code, clearly feels that it cannot count on divine protection [and should count itself fortunate not to be the target of divine wrath]. It has called on the services of Grace Hill Media to help to prepare the groundwork for the film, which is to be released next summer, and defuse controversy."
In a backhanded way, this whole plot substantiates the Christian assertion that Dan Brown’s novel is anti-Christian. There would be no need to spin the film as "Christian-friendly" were Hollywood unconcerned that the movie was offensive to Christian sensibilities.
Today, August 8, back in 1930 was the first appearance of Betty Boop, which occurred in the cartoon Dizzy Dishes by the Max Fleischer Studio.
This early incarnation of Betty was not much like her later self. For one thing, she wasn’t yet named Betty, much less Boop.
She also wasn’t a human being. She was a dog–a French poodle, specifically.
She was, however, modeled after a human actress named Helen Kane, who later sued Fleisher (unsuccessfully).
MORE ON HELEN KANE.
Betty inhabited a surreal world in which even the smallest inanimate object could take on a life of its own under the influence of Fleisher’s full animation techniques, and she went on to fame and stardom, working with greats such as Cab Calloway and Louis Armstrong.
She also became a starmaker herself, launching Popeye on his animation career.
After 1934, though, her overt . . . (ahem) . . . attractiveness had to be toned down due to Hollywood Production Code regulations.
Betty continues to be popular today, making an occasional appearance, as she did in a famous cameo in the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
Boop-oop-a-doop!
WATCH OR DOWNLOAD PUBLIC DOMAIN BETTY CARTOONS.
(Of special note: Minnie The Moocher.)
