Mentoring

Neil Simpson stole all of the stories that I was going to blog about

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Now what am I supposed to do?

You can read a bunch of the stories I was going to write about here in Neil Simpson’s round-up posted on Neil’s blog by Neil, (along with some other stories of interest that I missed!).

What should I do instead of blogging, then?

Well, nothing for me to do now. (I write these posts the night before they go up and schedule them, so it’s late Wednesday night right now)

I guess I’ll go play King’s Bounty: The Legend. (H/T ECM)

Here’s the trailer:

That track is called “Glory Ride”.

This week is “monitor my co-workers’ worldviews” week, so I am taking all my co-workers out for one-on-one lunches to monitor their worldviews, with a different co-worker every day this week. Today’s atheist and I discussed religious pluralism and Brit Hume’s evangelism. I pick the best people to have as non-Christian friends – every one is solid and engaging. I wish you all could see how much fun they are to talk to. Way more fun than the typical Christian you meet in church after the service!

Anyway, while walking up to my office after the lunch, I was humming the “Glory Ride” theme from King’s Bounty, because having relationships with non-Christians and talking about controversial things is dangerous and heroic, . If we had more Christians who could be friends with the people who are causing all these problems in high places, we would not be in this mess. We just need to study harder so that we have the confidence to speak up and connect Christianity to the issues of the day, e.g. – Brit Hume and religious pluralism.


News

MUST-READ: How divorce courts destroy the lives of fathers and children

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Consider this story from the Herald Sun in Australia.

Excerpt:

A mother found by the Family Court to be violent, untruthful, lacking moral values and responsible for the psychological and emotional abuse of her children has been given custody of them.

The father, deemed “principled” and with “much to offer his children”, has been effectively banned from seeing his daughters.

[…]The father… is described by a Family Court judge as no threat to his daughters, a successful parent who is “courteous” and “intelligent”.

The same judge found the mother… abandoned her first daughter at two and spurned the child’s subsequent attempts at reconciliation, had displayed “dreadful”, “cruel” and “malicious” behaviour.

But the judge still ruled that because of time spent apart, the children had become estranged from their father and it was in their interests that “the children spend no time with the father”.

Time spent apart? Why would a loving father willingly spend time apart from his own children?

Bill has not seen his daughters since April and has not spent extended time with them since August 2005.

He says the estrangement was largely a result of false allegations of sexual abuse of the children made against him by his former wife.

The custody ruling in the Family Court last month came after a seven-year battle over access to the girls, now aged nine and 11.

It followed a criminal trial in 2007, when Bill, 55, was cleared of the sexual abuse allegations. The trial judge found them totally false and threw the case out.

The ordeal has cost Bill his home, his job and about $450,000 in lost income and legal costs. He has faced court 70 times to clear his name and try for some form of access to his children.

“It has been a nightmare. All I wanted was to be part of my children’s lives – to try to give them a good start in life,” Bill said.

“But I am denied that because of the malicious way in which my ex-wife has acted and because of the credence the legal system has given her lies and falsehoods.

“The family law system needs wholesale change. There appears to be no testing of evidence in court and it seems that often lies and fabrications are immediately accepted as fact.

“It’s a disgrace and, as far as I know, it doesn’t happen in any other legal sphere.”

Bill’s case follows the case of “Steve” last year, in which the court accepted his good character, but banned him from seeing his daughter for seven years because it was believed the mother would “shut down” emotionally if he were allowed to see her.

In another case last year, a father, “Mick”, was jailed for sending a birthday card to his daughter in breach of a court order and was locked up again for taking a walk in a park – near where, unknown to him, his daughter was playing.

False allegations of sexual abuse are standard operating procedure in divorce courts in order to get custody of the children, and the child support payments that go with the children. The legal stakeholders in the divorce racket have every reason to help to the woman to make these false charges, because the father usually fights for custody, which is what keeps them all employed.

Further study

To find out more about the horrors of feminism and unilateral divorce, consider reading something by Stephen Baskerville and something by Jennifer Roback Morse. This podcast by Jennifer Roback Morse explains some of the threats to traditional marriage – it’s my favorite podcast ever. Women need to do a better job of understanding men, and understanding what has to change to make marriage attractive and appealing to men. That may involve changing laws to make these unfair divorce courts stop doing what they are doing.

One last thing. Most of my readers know that I am chaste, and so I have never been married or divorced. My parents are have been married for 40+ years. None of my immediate family is divorced. And none of my Christian friends are divorced. In fact, I have never experienced a divorce even vicariously by being friends with someone who was going through a divorce. And the point of this is to show you how Christians can become sensitive to an issue just by studying it. And this is what marriage-minded Christians need to do.

Christians need to study to understand the many serious problems that divorce causes for men and children. We should understand how marriage acts as a buffer to state power, thus protecting religious liberty. We should know how feminist policies weaken marriage and parenting. And we should understand how a stable marriage benefits children, and ultimately, society. When Christians inform themselves about these issues, it becomes easier to put ourselves second and act to preserve the marriage. Knowledge binds the will.

News

Assessing Martha Coakley’s fitness for the MA Senate seat

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Consider this disturbing article from CNN. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

Democrat Martha Coakley dodged a pointed question Tuesday about her claim during a Massachusetts Senate debate the night before that terrorists are no longer in Afghanistan.

During Monday’s debate with Republican Scott Brown, Coakley questioned why the United States still has troops in Afghanistan. She claimed that the al Qaeda terrorists who were originally targeted by American military action have migrated elsewhere, rendering the mission moot. “They’re gone,” she said. “They’re not there anymore. They’re in, apparently Yemen, they’re in Pakistan.”

A reporter asked Coakley about that claim after a Capitol Hill fundraiser on Tuesday. “Do you stand by that remark?” he asked.

Coakely, standing before a small cluster of reporters and cameras, listened to the question, then quickly looked in a different direction.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Did anybody else have a question?”

This is not the way that you deal with criticism and honest questions from reporters. It’s very dismissive of opposing views on a matter of tremendous importance to our national security. The right thing to do is apologize and admit you made a mistake, then move on to the next question.

Now consider another story from Politico.

Excerpt:

Last year, Coakley chose to personally argue her state’s case before the Supreme Court in Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts. Despite the recent headlines detailing forensic mishaps, fraudulent testimony and crime lab incompetence, Coakley argued that requiring crime lab technicians to be present at trial for questioning by defense attorneys would place too large a burden on prosecutors.

Coakley has made her reputation as a law-and-order prosecutor. More troubling, she’s shown a tendency to aggressively push the limits of the law in high-profile cases and an unwillingness to cop to mistakes — be they her own or those of other prosecutors.

[…]In the 1980s, Violet Amirault and her children, Gerald Amirault and Cheryl Amirault LeFave, were convicted of sexually abusing several children at their day care facility. The cases came at the height of the 1980s sex abuse panic, leading to false convictions across the country based on improper questioning of children, mass hysteria about sex abuse and Satan worship, and bogus “recovered-memory” psychotherapy. Coakley didn’t prosecute the Amiraults; her former boss Scott Harshbarger did. But the case against the family began to come apart during her tenure as district attorney. Despite a parole board’s 5-0 recommendation to grant Gerald Amirault clemency and mounting doubts about the evidence against him, Coakley publicly and aggressively lobbied then-Gov. Jane Swift to deny Amirault relief. Amirault remained in prison.

She seems to be incapable of admitting to anything that might put her in a bad light. She is so desperate to push an image, that she thinks that it is a waste of her time to listen to people who question her. This denial of reality and lack of humility seems to me to make her a bad choice for the Senate seat.

Doug Flutie endorses Scott Brown

In other news:

Interesting. I’m sure my Canadian readers will all recognize the greatest player to ever play in the Canadian Football League.