“I Am A Jelly Donut”?

Also today, June 26, but in 1963–mere months before he was shot dead in Dallas–President John F. Kennedy uttere the famous words "Ich bin ein Berliner."

By this he meant "I am a Berliner," and he said it as an expression of solidarity with the people of West Berlin, who were under dire threat from the Communist puppet state of East Germany and its Soviet masters.

The Berliners loved it. Wild cheers all round.

Now: Turns out that many folks today argue that Kennedy didn’t really say "I am a Berliner" in German. They claim that, instead, what he actually said was more like "I am a jelly donut." It wasn’t that he didn’t say the words "Ich bin ein Berliner" correctly. He said them right (albeit with his thick Boston accent). It’s that the words themselves are wrong.

According to this claim, in German the word "Berliner" is a reference to a kind of jelly donut. And it is. But not so much in Berlin, where Kennedy was speaking.

The "I am a jelly donut" thesis is reportedly an urban legend that started in the 1980s.

Not convinced? Well . . .

HERE’S AN ARTICLE FOR FURTHER CONSIDERATION.

And Then There Were Three

Today, June 26, in 1409 the Western Schism got 100% worse.

The reason? The Church now had 300% of the requisitie number of popes.

Now, in truth, it only had one real pope–ever. But there were at this time two additional "popes," or antipopes as they would be properly called, also running (or strolling or sitting) around Europe causing havoc.

On June 26, 1409 the second antipope, Alexander V, was "elected" by the Council of Pisa. (Not an ecumenical council.)

He wouldn’t last long.

Ten months later, he’d be dead, though he did have a successor.

Ultimately the Western Schism was sorted out in 1417, when the Council of Constance deposed the two antipopes, accepted the resignation of the true pope, and elected a new true pope, the way for one thus being cleared. The result being Pope Martin V.

Though the Western Schism was over, the damage it did to the fabric of Western Christendom was horrendous. The experience of having two–and then three–popes vying for power left severe questions in the minds of many folks, and the perception of the Church was gravely weakened.

This is thought by many historians to have been one of the reasons leading to the Protestant Reformation.

I’d love to give you a link where you could spit on the grave of Alexander V, but I don’t have one, so you’ll have to settle for

LEARNING MORE ABOUT HIM.

AND ABOUT THE SCHISM ITSELF.

The Big Little Man

CusterToday, June 25, in 1875, they fit the battle of Little Big Horn, resuting in the death of one of the biggest little men of the 19th century.

Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer made his last stand against the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho under the leadership of Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. Sitting Bull didn’t do a lot of sitting that day, though, and Crazy Horse didn’t prove too crazy, for Custer was shuffled off this mortal coil in a battle that lasted about two hours.

Vain and ambitious in life, Custer found the fame he was looking for in death.

So at least he got something out of the battle.

MORE ON CUSTER.

MORE ON THE BATTLE OF LITTLE BIG HORN.

Saddam Hussein: Novelist?

Captxdg13807011948iraq_saddam_xdg138It appears that Saddam Hussein (pictured left doing his Kevin McCarthy impression) may not only be guilty of crimes against humanity but also of crimes against the humanities!

Turns out he’s a novelist.

He’s already inflicted three novels on the world (published anonymously):

"Zabibah and the King" tells a story of a leader who sacrifices a luxurious life for the sake of his people.


"The Fortified Citadel" described the rise to power of Saddam’s Baath Party.


"Men and a City" is widely viewed as a thinly veiled autobiography, presenting him as powerful and heroic.

Now he has a new novel scheduled to come out. Unsurprisingly, it’s a religiously inflammatory geopolitical allegory:

"Get Out, Damned One" tells the story of a man called Ezekiel who
plots to overthrow a town’s sheik but is defeated in his quest by the
sheik’s daughter and an Arab warrior.

The story is apparently a metaphor for a Zionist-Christian plot
against Arabs and Muslims. Ezekiel is meant to symbolize the Jews.

Interestingly . . .

"Get Out, Damned One" describes an Arab leading an army that invades the land of the enemy and topples one of their monumental towers, an apparent reference to the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center in New York by Islamic militants of
Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network.


Ezekiel [a Jewish symbol] is portrayed as greedy, ambitious and destructive. Youssef, who symbolizes the Christians, is portrayed as generous and tolerant — at least in the early passages.

GET THE "STORY."

Of Course, This Is Totally Unscientific, But . . .

. . . I scored well on an unscientific IQ test.

Your IQ Is 140

Your Logical Intelligence is Genius
Your Verbal Intelligence is Genius
Your Mathematical Intelligence is Genius
Your General Knowledge is Genius

The questions involved more reasoning than I thought they would. It ain’t just a joke (as I thought it might be). Still not the real thing, though.

Curing Same-Sex Attractions

A reader writes:

Any ideas on what Christian homosexuals should do if they no longer want to be homosexual and would like to have children with a woman?  In other words, what could one do to change their sexual preference?

I’m afraid that I don’t have a lot of knowledge in this area, but we’ve had Dr. Joseph Nicolosi–a counselor who specializes in this area–on Catholic Answers Live before (LISTEN, DOWNLOAD).

I believe that Nicolosi is based in the L.A. area. If you live there you might be able to see him for help. Otherwise, you might be able to get a referral to someone in your area who could help.

Nicolosi is also head of a group called NARTH (National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality). Their website IS HERE.

There’s also a support group that I can recommend. It’s called Courage, and its website IS HERE.

Both the NARTH website and the Courage web site should contain links to additional resources, book recommendations, etc., as well as ways to contact folks dealing with the same issue.

I also have an additional piece of advice: It has long been my conviction that people should not define themselves by their sins or temptations. Thus I do not encourage people to identify themselves by saying "I am a homosexual" or "I am an alcoholic" or "I am an overeater" or "I am an anything else." People are people. They may have different temptations and different histories, but if they define themselves by the temptations they have or the mistakes they’ve made in the past, it will make it all the harder to deal with those temptations or overcome their past.

Everyone–regardless of their temptations or their backgrounds–is a person with dignity whom God loves and for whom Christ died and who, if he is a Christian, is indwelt by the Holy Spirit. Thus I would advise you not to think of yourself as a homosexual. You’re a person dear to God’s heart who happens to have same sex attractions to deal with, just as everyone has some kind of temptation to deal with. If you make the shift to thinking of yourself as a person who has an issue to overcome rather than as "a homosexual" then it will make it that much easier to overcome the problem.

Hope this helps, and God bless!

20

Happy Flying Saucer Day!

UfoToday, June 24, back in 1947 was the day which led to the coining of the term "flying saucer."

Pilot Kenneth Arnold saw what appeared to him to be a series of fast flying objects that he afterwards described as skipping on the air like a saucer being skipped across the water.

He was misquoted by the press, though, as having said that he saw "flying saucers." Arnold tried to correct the impression, saying that he didn’t say that the craft were saucer shaped but that they moved like a someone skipping a saucer on the water.

His actual description was: "They were half-moon shaped, oval in front and convex in the rear. …they
looked like a big flat disk." What he thus described as more like a "flying wing" aircraft design (something we puny humans had actually already built). Nertheless, the term (and the shape) stuck.

He also didn’t say anything about them being from outer space. In 1947, hot on the heels of WWII and all the weapons and aviation research it involved (including what we were retrieving from the Nazis via classified projects like Operation Paperclip), might have made a more terrestrial explanation plausible.

But that didn’t stick either.

GET THE STORY.

REVEALED! Tom Cruise Shows Oprah The "True Power" Of Scientology

Hollywood was abuzz last night when Tom Cruise was spotted at the opera, talking to a young fan about "The Tragedy of Darth L-Ron the Hack" and encouraging him to "take a broader perspective" on things. He offered to show the unnamed fan "the true power and nature" of Scientology.

The next day, with the fan watching from the audience, Cuise appeared on the Oprah show. During the interview, the television host asked probing questions about about his political ambitions, prompting the following exchange. . . .

Continue reading “REVEALED! Tom Cruise Shows Oprah The "True Power" Of Scientology”

REVEALED! Tom Cruise Shows Oprah The “True Power” Of Scientology

Hollywood was abuzz last night when Tom Cruise was spotted at the opera, talking to a young fan about "The Tragedy of Darth L-Ron the Hack" and encouraging him to "take a broader perspective" on things. He offered to show the unnamed fan "the true power and nature" of Scientology.

The next day, with the fan watching from the audience, Cuise appeared on the Oprah show. During the interview, the television host asked probing questions about about his political ambitions, prompting the following exchange. . . .

Continue reading “REVEALED! Tom Cruise Shows Oprah The “True Power” Of Scientology”

X Marks The Jewels

If you could wander the halls here at Catholic Answers, you’d be amazed at the tidbits you hear around the proverbial water cooler. Just the other day, a colleague told me about a real-life on-going treasure hunt. It sounded like just the thing for a blog post.

According to my colleague’s story, a retired businessman who loves treasure hunts decided to take one million dollars of his own money and create a nationwide treasure hunt. The money was converted into jewels created in the shape of various creatures, the most valuable of which is a spider valued at nearly a half-million dollars. He then had tokens made and hid the tokens throughout the country. He wrote a fairy tale with clues to the locations of the tokens and had the book published. Treasure hunters who follow the clues and find a token can redeem it for the jewel to which it corresponds. A number of families and even classrooms around the country have joined the hunt. Several tokens have been found and their jewels claimed, but a number are still out there … including the spider jewel.

THE TREASURE HUNT.

READ MORE HERE.

What struck me was how wonderful an idea it was for this gentleman to disperse his million dollars this way. Some may complain that he should have given it to charity, but as worthy as charities are and as much as they should be remembered by those with largesse to share, charities are not the only means by which people can be generous with each other. Sometimes it can be a good deed simply to give others pleasure … not to mention the thrill of discovery and the opportunity to spend time with friends and loved ones in the pursuit of a dream.