New Zealand Conservative

Last year, eighteen year old Grace Carroll presented her oral submission to a parliamentary select committee made up of people who seem to be in the main, for the redefinition of marriage and hostile to those that oppose it.   Last Sunday, after a Press Release by Bob McCoskrie on Grace's treatment by the committee,  the Sunday Star Times published an article on the hostility Grace experienced and the reaction of the committee to having their behaviour critisised. A teenager opposed to gay marriage has accused select committee members of behaving in a hostile and "menacing" way to submitters who are against a proposed law change for same-sex couples. Leader of conservative lobby group Family First Bob McCoskrie says the girl was treated apallingly [sic] by MPs when she told them during her oral submission that to allow homosexuals to marry would undermine the sanctity of marriage, with one calling her "homophobic" and another getting up for refreshments i...

We hear about "marriage equality" and perhaps we need to discuss "family equality"? The excerpt below considers families are in "evolution". I'll have to check with Dawkins, but is "devolution" also a possibility Complex questions about parental responsibility resurfaced late last year, as Kansas officials went after a Topeka man who answered a Craigslist ad from a lesbian couple seeking a sperm donor. Because no doctor was involved in the artificial insemination, the state sought to hold William Marotta financially responsible for the child when the women split up and one of them sought public assistance. A hearing is set for April. Many states haven't updated their laws to address the evolution of family structures _ such as same-sex families, single women conceiving with donated sperm or artificial inseminations performed without a doctor's involvement. This article simply thinks there is a "legal gap" to sort...

A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. My friends next month in Auckland we will be celebating a pagan festival dedicated in honour to the Gods of sexual hedonism. This festival has been in part funded with public money (yours). Politicians will bow before this God's altar including our Prime Minister and if the precidence of his predecessor is any guide the leader of the opposition at one of the major festival events, the "Big Gay Out". An event held not uncoincidentily on the Lord's Day, the Sabbath, Sunday the 9 th of February 2013 Another event, a street parade will take place on Saturday, February 16 th - mark this date. Later this year our parliament will rewrite our marriage laws and customs, and they...

Anyone know of any?

It's only the first reading of the bill, but it passed 388 to 1 in the Russian parliament: a bill to ban the promotion of homosexuality to children and to fine those who do. Of course, there was a small protest of 20 people. It looks like this will ban gay parades, promotion on TV and other media etc... The Duma passed the bill in the first of three readings by 388 votes to one, and applause rippled through the chamber. “We live in Russia, not Sodom and Gomorrah,” United Russia deputy Dmitry Sablin said before the vote. “Russia is a thousands-years-old country founded on its own traditional values – the protection of which is dearer to me than even oil and gas.” The law targets those who promote homosexuality to children, and is designed to bolster family values, according to the MPs who proposed it. Similar legislation has been passed in several Russian regions over the past two years, including the city of St Petersburg, and now the bill looks set to take hold nationwi...

"Clearly unintended pregnancy is an important public health problem for everyone. It seems particularly important for the military population because obviously it can disrupt a woman's career," Grossman said. It seems 10% of US military women had an "unintended pregnancy" last year. And this problem takes on greater urgency because the latest success for the "gender is a social construct" crowd is the news that women are to be allowed to deploy in front line combat roles . My goodness is anyone surprised that " (t)hat figure is also 50 percent higher than rates of unintended pregnancy among similarly aged women the general, non-military public" . What planet are these social engineers from, what fantasy land do they inhabit? Young women at the age that they serve in the military are designed by nature to get pregnant, it is part of the lifecycle of the human being. And here young women in their years of peak fertility they are confi...

A Catholic adoption agency looks to lose it's charitable status in Scotland because it gives priority to Catholic couples who have married for at least two years, and not gay couples. The OSCR [Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator] report found the agency gives greater priority to prospective adoptive parents who are a couple, Catholic, married for at least two years and wish to adopt within the framework of the Catholic faith. Because marriage is not yet available to gay couples, the regulator ruled this “constitutes direct discrimination” and breached equality laws because access to the benefit the charity is providing is “unduly restricted”. “OSCR also finds that this discrimination causes disbenefit to same-sex couples. For these reasons OSCR finds that the charity does not provide public benefit and it therefore fails the charity test,” the report concluded. Yet another cudgel to beat Catholics into line, the charity status. We're just going to have to fore go ...

Looks like Gareth Morgan has some competition.  No, he's not after cats, he's after us! Humans are a plague on the Earth that need to be controlled by limiting population growth, according to Sir David Attenborough. The television presenter said that humans are threatening their own existence and that of other species by using up the world’s resources. He said the only way to save the planet from famine and species extinction is to limit human population growth. “We are a plague on the Earth. It’s coming home to roost over the next 50 years or so. It’s not just climate change; it’s sheer space, places to grow food for this enormous horde. Either we limit our population growth or the natural world will do it for us, and the natural world is doing it for us right now,” he told the Radio Times. Sir David, who is a patron of the Population Matters, has spoken out before about the “frightening explosion in human numbers” and the need for investment in sex education and ot...

Nothing like a bit of directness. Japan doesn't put the same value on human life that Western countries do, due to our Christian roots, so there may not be the same aversion to speaking more directly as to how some governments may feel about keeping old, dependent people alive when they seem to have no apparent purpose. This is the euthanasia mindset for you, just more overt when coming from a non-Christian culture. TOKYO, January 23, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The recently-elected government of Japan has made itself heard on the life issues. Finance minister Taro Aso, said on Monday that elderly and financially dependent Japanese have a duty to die quickly to take pressure off the government-funded social service system . “Heaven forbid if you are forced to live on when you want to die,” Aso said. He described elderly people in need of care as “tube people” and complained that it costs “several tens of millions of yen” a month to care for a patient in the final stages of life...

The Media Report website posted last week that the Philadelphia priest who was found guilty last year and jailed, may have been imprisoned for a crime that never happened. The conviction of Philadelphia's Msgr. William J. Lynn last June was historic and widely trumpeted by an overheated media, as Lynn became the first member of the Catholic hierarchy to be found guilty in a criminal court for endangering children. And the sole reason Lynn sits in jail today is because former priest Edward Avery had pleaded guilty to sexually violating a 10-year-old boy in the late 1990s. Prosecutors claimed that Lynn should not have placed Avery into a ministry assignment because the priest had a prior abuse accusation dating back to the 1970s. Had Lynn kept Avery out of public ministry, prosecutors charged, he would not have been able to abuse the 10-year-old. But in a truly shocking development , Avery took the witness stand today in a Philadelphia courtroom and recanted under o...

From the YouTube video above: Saying "I believe in God" means grounding my life in Him, letting His Word guide each day, in the concrete choices without fear of losing something of myself, said Pope Benedict this morning during the general audience in Paul VI Hall, in a new series of catechesis on the Creed . When we say, "I believe in God," we say, like Abraham: "I trust you, I entrust myself to You, Lord," but not as Someone to run to only in times of difficulty or to whom to dedicate a few moments of the day or of the week. Believing in God, added the Pope, makes us bearers of values which often do not coincide with the prevailing fashion and opinion . He said: "The Christian should not be afraid to go "against the grain" to live his or her faith, resisting the temptation to conform ... The whole audience:

Kevin Walsh of the University of Richmond School of Law writes: The twitterverse is alive with tweets about Justice Scalia’s headgear for today’s inauguration. At the risk of putting all the fun speculation to an end . . . The hat is a custom-made replica of the hat depicted in Holbein’s famous portrait of St. Thomas More. It was a gift from the St. Thomas More Society of Richmond, Virginia. We presented it to him in November 2010 as a memento of his participation in our 27th annual Red Mass and dinner. Wearing the cap of a statesman who defended liberty of church and integrity of Christian conscience to the inauguration of a president whose policies have imperiled both : Make of it what you will. St. Thomas More was executed for not agreeing that Henry VIII could take over from the pope as the head of the Church of England. I'd say that this was a pretty strong statement from Scalia, to those that have eyes to see. Hattip: WDTPRS Related link: Scalia Wears Martyr’s Cap t...

I find this sort of story disturbing. Islam takes over the most ancient part of the world, then makes no attempt to preserve anything old, and even destroys it, and then wants those who did carefully look after ancient items to give them back. Turkey has been accused of cultural chauvinism and attempting to blackmail some of the world's most important museums in the wake of its demands for the return of thousands of archaeological treasures. According to cultural chiefs in Berlin, Paris and New York, Turkey has threatened to bar foreign archaeologists from excavation sites in the country by not renewing their digging permits if governments refuse to return artefacts that Ankara says were unlawfully removed from Turkish soil. It has also threatened to halt the lending of its treasures to foreign museums, they say. The government in Ankara, emboldened by the country's growing diplomatic and economic clout, has repeatedly said that the retrieval of the artefacts is part of ...

Back when Asterix was a 4 month old kitten, she caught this rat. The picture doesn't really do it justice as to how big the thing was, especially when it was sitting upright in my kitchen hissing at everyone.After I had finished panicking, my son and I drove it outside with brooms, with Asterix helping it along by giving it a number of whacks on the head every once in a while.  How she managed to get it inside, I don't know. The rat probably survived, however, as it ran down the side of the house and escaped down the drain.   I talked to a rodent exterminator a few weeks later about it, and he said drains were a good method of travel for rats, and here I'd been thinking it had gone to it's death and drowned. Since growing up to being an almost 4 year old cat, Asterix over the years has caught and killed a number of rats.  Some, she has part eaten.  In Autumn, she catches a lot of mice and hardly comes in for food, because she'll eat the mice she catches....

This is just so wrong. A distinguished scientist is determined to turn back time and recreate a Neanderthal baby – but he needs an adventurous woman to help. Harvard Medical School genetics professor George Church is adamant he can bring our extinct ancestor back to life now technology is so advanced, but he first needs to find a female willing to carry the baby, the Daily Mail has reported . Let's just say the scientist succeeded and managed to create a Neanderthal baby, I don't think it would be actually human the way we are, with a body and soul. It would end up being a human looking animal, that is extinct for good reason. Best to keep it that way. Related link: Mother wanted for Neanderthal baby ~ Stuff

An interesting article on chivalry, after the results of a new survey of women, was published in the Dominion Post on Saturday. I searched around, and found the original on the Telegraph website. Chivalry – alive or dead? According to a new survey, it’s not only on a life support machine but there are legions of women queuing to pull the plug. Ninety-two per cent of women wouldn’t take a seat that was offered to them by a man. Eighty-nine per cent would refuse help with heavy bags. Even on a cold day, 78 per cent would not take a coat from a man. So while I thought chivalry was an act of kindness dating back to medieval times, when noble knights led a life of gallantry, honour and courtesy, the researchers of an online sock company have put me right. In fact, chivalry is dark and sinister, a powerful reminder that men believe they are the stronger sex. A man who gives up a seat, pays the bill or walks on the outside of the pavement is actually signifying his belief in gender inequ...

Now that's an image of a priest that you don't get often! Though, in these times, not a bad idea. I'll be learning how to do it myself at some point in the not too distant future. Related link: A day with S.W.A.T.

Another post by anti-Catholic bigot, Whale Oil on Catholic Church to retain right to be homophobic bigots in Australia . He says: The Catholic Church might be complicit in condoning and covering boy buggering but at least they will retain the right to continue to be homophobic bigots in Australia. Whale Oil's formula when commenting on the Church's opposition to same-sex marriage is to pull out a sin by some of the Church's members and then use that sin as a kudgel to beat down anything the Church might do or say. It's certainly effective to a certain extent about keeping that sin in the public mind. He uses the same technique against teachers as well. How would it work if everyone applied it? It could get ugly, really ugly. Not wanting to follow in the footsteps of the Accuser, I remain silent. Though, the use of the word "might", bolded above by me, seems to indicate a chink in certainty. The Church is full of sinners in need of redemption...

More than one thousand Catholic priests in Britain have signed a letter articulating their fears of a new wave of anti-Catholic persecution in Britain if marriage is redefined. In one of the biggest joint letters of its type ever written , they raise fears that their freedom to practise and speak about their faith will be “severely” limited and dismiss Government reassurances as "meaningless". They even liken David Cameron’s moves to redefine marriage to those of Henry VIII, whose efforts to secure a divorce from Katherine of Aragon triggered centuries of bloody upheaval between church and state . They claim that, taken in combination with equalities laws and other legal restraints, the Coalition's plans will prevent Catholics and other Christians who work in schools, charities and other public bodies speaking freely about their beliefs on the meaning of marriage. Even the freedom to speak from the pulpit could be under threa t, they claim. And they fear that ...

The video above is an interview with the mother of 18 year old Marla Cardamone who was killed while having an abortion ( WARNING: Contains Graphic Images ). She has given permission for pictures of her daughter and unborn granddaughter to be used in a campaign by pro-life group Life Dynamics. This is the first time images like this have been used and Marla's mother wants people to see what Planned Parenthood did to her daughter. A pro-life group has released the graphic images today of a woman who was killed in a botched legal abortion. The group says they are some of the first images ever seen publicly of a woman who was brutalized by an abortion that claimed her life. When 18-year-old Marla Cardamone was killed having an abortion at a Pennsylvania hospital, her mother, Deborah, vowed that she would never let her daughter be forgotten.  Then, late last year, she approached the pro-life group Life Dynamics and asked the group’s president Mark Crutcher to help her show the ...

He missed out "marriage equality", the biggest piece of political propaganda around, of the type that Goebbels would be proud of. I mean, if you are against "equality", there must be something wrong with you! An early propaganda poster for "marriage equality", designed in 2008 by Shepard Fairey, the graphic designer and illustrator who created the iconic images for Obama's campaign. (Source Towleroad - A site with homosexual tendencies ) "Marriage equality" as a phrase is a clever catchphrase for those who don't think too deeply . It's mostly meaningless, in that it tries to equate the supposed marriage of two of the same sex as equal to that of a man and a woman - except that two of the same sex cannot marry because they are not a man and a woman. It is impossible to call a same-sex relationship marriage , except if you want to introduce lies into the language. Equality is not missing, but an understanding of what realit...

First Stuff , now TVNZ have noticed the story that the Archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Nichols has shut down the "gay Masses" in Soho, London. LONDON, January 2, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In a surprising reversal of six years of policy, the Archbishop of Westminster has rescinded permission for a group of homosexual activists to hold specially dedicated Masses at which the homosexual lifestyle was promoted as morally acceptable for Catholics. Archbishop Vincent Nichols issued a letter today saying that “after six years of the pastoral care,” the notorious Soho Masses will no longer be offered at Our Lady of the Assumption church in central London. “It is time for a new phase,” Nichols wrote. However, neither article mentions that the organiser of the Masses is not worried by the closure in the slightest. [D]espite Nichols’ letter, the Soho Mass organizers themselves appear unfazed. Terrence Weldon, a founding member of the Soho Masses organizing team, wrote today...

Today is the Feast of Mary, Mother of God .  Most fitting for the beginning of the year.