Supporting the Separation of Church and State
Posts Tagged ‘Liberality’
Wildfires Charity Update
Categorized: Activism
Tagged: California Wildfires, Charity, Diligence, Kindness, Liberality
We have created a poll on the sidebar to make voting for your choice of charity easier. For those who missed the story (you can read it here) we are donating 100% of the money made from this website for the month of October to our readers choice of charity. Originally we planned to donate only the profits but after a short discussion we decided that we would instead donate the entire months income.
So please hurry up and cast your votes. We will be extending the deadline until 8am Monday morning to give more people the chance to vote. As before if you wish to suggest a charity not listed on the poll just place a comment on this story or the prior story and it will be added.
Please help us support those who have lost everything to this terrible disaster.
~ William ~
P.S. Thanks to those of you who have already voted.
7 Top Charities for California Wildfire Relief
Categorized: Activism
Tagged: California Wildfires, Diligence, Liberality
As you all know California has recently been struck a terrible blow by raging wildfires which destroyed some 1800 homes. If you have been following the news you undoubtedly know that the political maneuvering started almost as fast as the fires themselves, and spread even faster. Coming from a proud tradition of firefighters I know that the worst thing you can do is politicize what is truly a human tragedy. In these circumstances it is best to simply pull together and help in any way you can, regardless of the politics involved.
Your Part:
We are calling on all our readers to donate or volunteer for the charity of your choice to help out the relief efforts in California. There is a list below with several great organizations that have already done so much. Even a small donation will help out. If you know of any we missed please put them in a comment and we will add them.
Our Part:
As our way of putting our money where our mouth is we will donate all profits from all of October to the Charity of Your Choice. Any charity that is working to help in California is eligible so write in your vote in the comments below. Every penny earned over expenses by this website for October will be donated so make sure you get your vote in by 5:00 on Friday November 2nd as we will be making the donation sometime Friday night.
Charities & Volunteer Opportunities:
Important notice: In the wake of any natural disaster there are those who would take advantage of the natural outpouring of support. Sadly this time is no different, so please wherever you decide to lend your support be careful of fraudulent charities.
- Habitat for Humanity: – A great group that works to eliminate homelessness and their services are likely to be very valuable as thousands of low income families have lost their homes.
- Second Harvest: – Extraordinary group that works year round to help more than 25 million low income Americans get the food they need. Find out how to help here.
- The Salvation Army: – There are many ways to donate to the Salvation Army and right now there will be shortages of everything.
- California Volunteers: – If you live in the area and are looking for ways to volunteer there is no shortage of need. This group is a great start to get you hooked up with the people who can use your help. You can also make a donation by calling 1-800-750-2858.
- Tzu Chi Foundation: – A Buddhist group which was founded by Dharma Master Cheng Yen in 1966 because she felt that “lack of love for others” has been the root of many problems in this world. “To save the world, we must begin by transforming human hearts.”
- San Diego Humane Society and SPCA: – And lastly lets not forget about the animals who need our help as well. The San Diego Humane Society can really use all the help they can get right now. Keep an eye on this page for updates on everything they are doing to help animals affected by the fires.
- The American Red Cross: – Using the online donation form you can choose the California Wildfires or any other area for your donation. I understand that many have problems with their operations but they are one of the big guys so they needed including. I would highly suggest that you earmark the donation to the California Wildfires if you are concerned with that money being used to support local churches.
There are of course hundreds and hundreds more but we wanted to cover some of the biggest as well as a couple of our favorites. There is a much longer list here, as well as more detailed commentary on the groups policies and practices. If you see any there you feel deserve mention here please list them in the comments.
~ William ~
P.S. Remember we are pledging all profits from October through this Friday to the charity of your choice so don’t forget to vote in the comments section below.
Huckabee Says Abortion is Like Holocaust
Categorized: Republicans
Tagged: 2008 Election, Anti-Choice, Christianity, Feminism, LGBTQ Rights, Liberality, Mike Huckabee, Reproductive Rights
Jamie Crawford, CNN Political Ticker, reported that former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee likened abortions in America to the holocaust. His exact words were, “Sometimes we talk about why we’re importing so many people in our workforce. It might be for the last 35 years, we have aborted more than a million people who would have been in our workforce had we not had the holocaust of liberalized abortion under a flawed Supreme Court ruling in 1973.”
As I have written time and again, conservative right wing republicans cannot argue with logic so they bring on the barrage of verbal nastiness. Almost everyone agrees that the holocaust was a horrible thing so equating whatever it is that they don’t agree with with either Nazi’s or the holocaust itself is a surefire way to rile up their followers. The other word that they have managed to manipulate to conjure up images of death, torment, and horror is liberal. Notice that he doesn’t just say abortion it’s “liberalized” abortion.
These semantic games that they are playing have been highly tuned to strike just the right chord in their close minded base. It doesn’t matter that logically the holocaust and legalized abortion have nothing in common or that “liberal” means “favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum individual freedom possible, esp. as guaranteed by law and secured by governmental protection of civil liberties.”
Huckabee also pulled out another verbal weapon from his arsenal “God”. In the same speech he stated “I’m very tired of hearing people who are unwilling to change the constitution, but seem more than willing to change the holy word of God as it relates to the definition of marriage.”
This statement is, to me, the embodiment of what is wrong with the Religious Right. He makes it clear that he believes political decisions should be guided by religious beliefs, effectively throwing the separation of church and state right out of the window. He said this while speaking to the crowd about the necessity of conservative lawmakers to pressure for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman.
To sum up Huckabee’s apparent platform: The Christian conservatives’ idea of God and his wishes will decide the laws and anyone who disagrees are liberalized nazi’s. Nice.
We Are Not “Anti-Christianity”
Categorized: Religion
Tagged: Abstinence, Chastity, Christianity, Diligence, Humility, Kindness, Liberality, Patience
WWJV4.com is a progressive political blog that focuses a lot on the infringement of religion in politics. This certainly does not mean that we are anti-religion. We support comments from any belief system, religion, or political standing. We believe in the first amendment and wish to provide a place where intelligent conversation and debate can take place.
We believe that whether or not you personally believe in any god, the teachings of Jesus of love, peace, and forgiveness, are such that almost anyone can support them. What we do not agree with is these teachings being distorted and used to promote division, injustice, intolerance, bigotry, and discrimination against anyone.
It has been our experience that the people who argue the loudest against things like womens’ right to choose, gay rights, and acceptance of all cultures often have no idea why they believe so strongly. They are often unable to cite sources, refute arguments with evidence, or even remain civil. I wrote the other day that it will be important for the future of this nation to reach out to the Christian conservatives. I believe that many of them have their eyes closed to what is really going on and the hatred that they may be unknowingly spreading.
What we hope to do with this site is not to disparage or downgrade anyone’s beliefs but to share information. Information that may cause someone to really look at whether or not what they are clinging to as “Christian” or religious ideals are truly the messages of their gods.
To that end we will not accept comments that promote hatred or violence toward any group of people, use foul or degrading language directed at a person or group of people, or are otherwise found to be inappropriate by our moderators. We will always communicate with our submitters to advise if there are any problems with the content of the comments and give any rejected a chance to reword their thoughts.
Thank you,
WWJV4.com
Pope Supports Law That Kills Women
Categorized: Religion
Tagged: Catholicism, Feminism, Liberality, Nicaragua, Reproductive Rights
I ran across this story on Crooks and Liars and thought that it is of great importance to you because it will happen here if the religious right successfully overturns Roe v. Wade. You should also notice how the religious right and their “culture of life” is so clearly nothing more than words.
Recently Pope Benedict XVI praised Nicaragua for enacting a total ban on abortions. This includes abortions for rape or incest and also abortions necessary to save the life of the mother. Since last November this ban on abortions has cost at least 80 lives according to women’s rights advocacy groups.
These are 80 young women who died because they did not have access to clean and safe abortion facilities when their lives depended on it. Jazmina Bojorge has the unfortunate distinction of being the first. She died due to complications in her pregnancy 36 hours after going to a hospital for fever and abdominal pains.
After her death Rev. Rolando Alvarez, spokesperson for the Managua archdiocese, has stated that the church will push lawmakers to clarify the ban to allow the saving of the mothers life. Since that time around 80 more women have died.
Here in America the ruling finding the “Partial-Birth” Abortion Ban unconstitutional was recently overturned. The Supreme Court ruled that a complete ban on Partial Birth abortions was indeed constitutional. The Act actually states that there is NEVER a time when this is a necessary procedure to save the life of the mother. Read the entire act here.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote in her dissent that the latest decision “tolerates, indeed applauds, federal intervention to ban nationwide a procedure found necessary and proper in certain cases by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists”.
While in itself the ban is a small step compared to the total ban that Nicaragua has, it is still a dangerous step along a very slippery and steep slope. The religious right simply will not rest as long as women are allowed to control their own reproductive rights.
Currently of the top candidates only the 3 Democrats expressed any concern over this bill. Obama, Edwards, and Clinton all came out strongly opposed to any reduction in women’s reproductive freedom. Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani both flip flopped from prior documented pro-abortion stands to more religious-right-friendly anti-choice stands.
I believe that we have come to a time where we can trust women to make their own medical decisions. While we cannot help those poor women in Nicaragua we can remain diligent to prevent their misery and deaths from befalling any more innocent lives.
~ William ~
P.S. If anyone knows of an organization that is helping in Nicaragua please post it in the comments. I would love to throw them some free publicity and any help we can. Women of all countries should have the freedom to control their own bodies.
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