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  Benedict's Funeral "with Simplicity"
Posted by: Stone - 01-01-2023, 06:45 AM - Forum: General Commentary - Replies (2)

Benedict's Funeral "with Simplicity"

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gloria.tv | December 31, 2022


Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni announced that Benedict received the Last Rites on Wednesday afternoon after Holy Mass.

He will lie-in-state in St. Peter’s Basilica from Monday January 2nd till Wednesday January 4th. Benedict XVI’s funeral will be presided by Francis on Thursday, January 5, in St Peter’s Square to allow the most possible people to assist in person.

In accordance with Benedict’s wishes, his funeral rites will take place "with simplicity." Benedict XVI will be buried in the Vatican Grottoes in the tomb of John XXIII, where John Paul II was initially laid to rest.

Cardinal Gerhard Müller, who founded the Benedict XVI Institute to make available Joseph Ratzinger’s collected works, told NcRegister.com that Benedict XVI will be remembered as “true doctor of the Church for Today” and a “great thinker.”

Archbishop Georg Gänswein said that Benedict told him in his last hours, “Please pray for me!"

For Gänswein the death means “a great and personal loss,” “I am deeply grateful and at the same time very sad.”

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  Former Pope Benedict XVI dies at 95
Posted by: Stone - 12-31-2022, 08:55 AM - Forum: The Architects of Vatican II - Replies (1)

May God have mercy on his soul. He was very influential as a peritus at Vatican II, through which 'the smoke of Satan entered the Church.'


Former Pope Benedict XVI dies at 95


BBC | December 31, 2022


Former Pope Benedict XVI has died at his Vatican residence, aged 95, almost a decade after he stood down because of ailing health.

He led the Catholic Church for less than eight years until, in 2013, he became the first Pope to resign since Gregory XII in 1415.

Benedict spent his final years at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery within the walls of the Vatican.

His successor Pope Francis said he had visited him there frequently.

The Vatican said in a statement: "With sorrow I inform you that the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, passed away today at 9:34 in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican.

"Further information will be provided as soon as possible."

The Vatican said the body of the Pope Emeritus will be placed in St Peter's Basilica from 2 January for "the greeting of the faithful".

Plans for Pope Benedict's funeral will be announced in the next few hours, the Vatican said.

The head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, said Pope Benedict was "one of the great theologians of the 20th century".

In a statement he said: "I remember with particular affection the remarkable Papal Visit to these lands in 2010. We saw his courtesy, his gentleness, the perceptiveness of his mind and the openness of his welcome to everybody that he met."

"He was through and through a gentleman, through and through a scholar, through and through a pastor, through and through a man of God - close to the Lord and always his humble servant."

Although the former pontiff had been ill for some time, Vatican authorities said there had been an aggravation in his condition because of advancing age.

On Wednesday, Pope Francis appealed to his final audience of the year at the Vatican to "pray a special prayer for Pope Emeritus Benedict", whom he said was very ill.

Born Joseph Ratzinger in Germany, Benedict was 78 when in 2005 he became one of the oldest popes ever elected.

For much of his papacy, the Catholic Church faced allegations, legal claims and official reports into decades of child abuse by priests.

Earlier this year the former Pope acknowledged that errors had been made in the handling of abuse cases while he was archbishop of Munich between 1977 and 1982.

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  Vatican: Ratzinger "lucid and alert... extremely serene, concelebrated mass"
Posted by: Stone - 12-30-2022, 08:50 AM - Forum: General Commentary - No Replies

Vatican: "Ratzinger lucid and alert. Serious but stable conditions"
Hours of apprehension for the 95-year-old pontiff emeritus. Sources of Mater Ecclesiae: "" It is extremely serene, concelebrated mass". German press: "He refused hospitalization"

[Computer translated from the Italian]QuotidianoNazionale | December 29, 2022

"The Pope emeritus managed to rest well last night, it is absolutely lucid and alert and today, while its conditions remain serious, the situation is currently stable". This was reported by the director of the Vatican Press Office, Matteo Bruni, answering questions from journalists on the conditions of Benedict XVI. "Pope Francis renews the invitation to pray for him and to accompany him in these difficult hours", adds Bruni. With this intention, tomorrow at 5.30 pm, Mass will also be celebrated in the basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano, cathedral of Rome, presided over by Bishop Guerino Di Tora.

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Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI ( Ansa )

The 95 year old Joseph Ratzinger it is located on the first floor of the former Mater ecclesiae monastery (his home from 2 May 2013) and is assisted by Monsignor Georg Gaenswein and by the secular nuns, the four memores domains of Communion and Liberation. To also provide assistance the Vatican nurse, between Eligio, and the personal doctor Patrizio Polisca. And sources close to the monastery let it be known that "is extremely peaceful", he wears a coat and at the moment of mass he concelebrates [the Novus Ordo] with a stole that is placed on his shoulders. According to Bild, "Benedict XVI does not want to be taken to the hospital, despite being seriously ill".


Pope emeritus, unprecedented situation

In these hours of apprehension and waiting, the hypotheses about what will happen next increase. In the event of the death of the Pope Emeritus, the only certainty is that it will be Pope Francis to decide how the funeral, most likely of the State, will take place from "Pontefice". And Bergoglio himself could preside over the Liturgy ( while for the death of a Pope it is the dean of cardinals who does it, ed. ). Given the unprecedented situation, the procedures will be established from scratch, also from the point of view of dressing. Benedict XVI, in these almost ten years as Emeritus, has never given up on the white robe and therefore one could decide to leave the papal vestments. In 2020 Ratzinger indicated the place where he wanted to be buried: the tomb that belonged to John Paul II, in the crypt of St. Peter. Sepulcher remained free from the moment of the canonization of Wojtyla, whose remains were transferred to a chapel near Michelangelo's Pietà.

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  WEF To Accelerate Push For 'Metaverse' Surveillance Network At Davos 2023
Posted by: Stone - 12-30-2022, 08:42 AM - Forum: Great Reset - No Replies

WEF To Accelerate Push For 'Metaverse' Surveillance Network At Davos 2023

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ZH | DEC 29, 2022
Authored by Jordan Schachtel via The Dossier,

During its 2023 Davos conference, the World Economic Forum will host a press conference on its “Building The Metaverse Initiative,” and release key “studies” and details about its efforts to further facilitate what appears to amount to a global surveillance network, according to documents reviewed by The Dossier.

The Metaverse, a buzzworthy bumper sticker slogan that refers to a whole host of ideas in the technology space, has potential current and future applications both for private and governmental entities. It will be featured as one of the core staples of the 2023 Davos conference.

What is the Metaverse, exactly?

The term Metaverse was invented by author Neal Stephenson in his 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash, in which citizens used digital avatars as a means to escape their dystopian reality.

Today it can be defined as “a vision of what many in the computer industry believe is the next iteration of the internet: a single, shared, immersive, persistent, 3D virtual space where humans experience life in ways they could not in the physical world.” Before its expanded definition, the Metaverse encompassed a technologically advancing virtual and augmented reality space.

To entrepreneurs and technology companies, this computer world can serve as a potential revenue and data harvesting stream. For the committed forces of technocratic tyranny, the Metaverse can act as a global surveillance network that can keep tabs on anyone with an internet connection. A Metaverse-adopting society can make it much easier for ruling governments to track the movement, behaviors, and activities of its citizens.

For the World Economic Forum, the narrative and ideas shop of the ruling class, the latter applications are more aligned with their feudalistic ambitions.

The WEF is the chief coalition builder for what amounts to the modern depopulation movement. Over the years, they've partnered with Big Tech, central bankers, governmental, and international organizations to facilitate their feudalistic vision for the future, which involves deliberately rolling back human progress, innovation, and flourishing, under the guise of saving the planet from a “climate emergency.” While various WEF “partners” have different motives for joining the ruling class alliance, they all have an incentive to cater to the WEF’s most prized climate hoax narratives.

The WEF Metaverse press conference event description reads:
Quote:“This press conference will announce the first, and long-awaited, outputs of the Defining and Building the Metaverse Initiative: highly anticipated briefing papers on Interoperability in the Metaverse from the governance track of the project, and Demystifying the Consumer Metaverse from the value creation track. These two briefing papers, the first in each workstream’s series, will serve as the foremost publications involving this amount of research, this number of stakeholders from diverse industries (120+ partners are involved in this initiative), into these topics.”

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The WEF will also host an event at Davos 2023 titled “Deployment In The Industrial Metaverse.” Panelists will discuss how “the next era of the internet is fast approaching in the form of the metaverse, an immersive, interoperable and synchronous digital world.” 

“In the industrial metaverse, unique opportunities will arise from the convergence of artificial intelligence, digital twins, data and robotic technologies,” the readout continues.

The Dossier reviewed a list of the listed partners to the World Economic Forum’s Metaverse Initiative. They include corporate actors like Meta (formerly known as Facebook), Microsoft, Walmart, and Sony. Notably, the list includes major financial services and banking enterprises, such as Mastercard, Deutsche Bank, J.P. Morgan, and Lloyds.

Things really take a dark turn when moving down to the state and global governance partners to the WEF’s Metaverse Initiative. These partners include Interpol, the United Nations counter terrorism office, the U.S. NIH’s National Human Genome Research Institute, and several additional countries’ information and communication ministries.

[Image: c5556d33-5403-4f26-9caa-b909c0e6c0cf_159...k=Qefna1Tz]

The WEF looks to the Chinese Communist Party as the model nation for proper governance. The CCP’s nationwide surveillance regime, through its “Great Firewall” and other components, could very well become the standard for Metaverse governance.

Earlier this month, the WEF published an article titled, “why we need to regulate digital identity in the Metaverse,” revealing that Davos indeed sought a heavy-handed top-down approach akin to the CCP’s measures.

In May, WEF founder Klaus Schwab addressed his organization’s Metaverse work. Schwab reveals a lot about his intentions in his framing of the term, stating:

“The metaverse will influence the way, people, governments, companies and society at large think, work, interact and communicate for the purpose of collectively addressing issues on the global agenda.”

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  St. Alphonsus Liguori: "On the Education of Children,"
Posted by: Stone - 12-29-2022, 07:28 AM - Forum: Church Doctrine & Teaching - Replies (2)

A Man’s Future Relies on What He Received as a Child
by St. Alphonsus Marie Liguori


In August 2013, the Vatican Apostleship of Prayer released a commentary on Catholic parents’ responsibility to educate their children. In it were many progressivist messages and little sound teaching.

For example, parents were told that a primary mission was to be “witnesses of responsible solidarity” and that they must be the “living witness to the human and humanizing warmth which every child has a right to receive.” Nothing was said about the duty to teach children to practice the Ten Commandments, the Catholic Faith and Morals.

In view of this lacuna, we thought it convenient to reproduce here the advice for parents of St. Alphonsus Marie Liguori (Church Doctor, 1696-1787), who was commenting on the Gospel verse "A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit." (Mt 7:18)

In the first part of his sermon, reproduced below, he teaches how important it is to bring up children in habits of virtue.




Then the Gospel of this day tells us, that a good plant cannot produce bad fruit, and that a bad one cannot produce good fruit. Learn from this, brethren, that a good father brings up good children. But, if parents are wicked, how can the children be virtuous?

Have you ever, says the Redeemer, in the same Gospel, seen grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? "Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?" (v. 16.) And, in like manner, it is impossible, or rather very difficult, to find children virtuous, who are brought up by immoral parents.

Fathers and mothers, you must be attentive to this sermon, which is of great importance to the eternal salvation of yourselves and of your children. Be attentive, young men and young women, who have not yet chosen a state of life. If you wish to marry, learn this day the obligations that you can contract with regard to the education of your children; and learn also that, if you do not fulfill them, you shall bring yourselves and all your children to damnation.

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A child is given to parents as a trust for which they must render an account to God

I will divide this sermon into two points.

In the first, I will show how important is to bring up children in habits of virtue; and in the second, I will show with what care and diligence a parent ought to labor to bring them up well.

First Point: How very important it is to bring up children in habits of virtue

1. A father owes two obligations to his children: He is bound to provide for their corporal wants, and to educate them in the habits of virtue. It is not necessary at present to say more on the first obligation than that there are some fathers more cruel than the most ferocious of wild beasts, for these do not forget to nourish their offspring. Indeed, certain parents squander away all their property or fruits of their industry by drinking and gambling, and allow their children to die of hunger. But let us come to the education, which is the subject of my discourse.

2. It is certain that a child's future good or ill conduct depends on whether he was well formed or ill formed. Nature itself teaches every parent to attend to the education of his offspring. He who gave them their being ought to endeavor to make life useful to them. God gives children to parents so that they may be formed in the fear of God, and be directed in the way of eternal salvation.

"We have," says St. Chrysostom, "a great investment in our children; let us attend to them with great care." (Homily IX, in 1 ad Tit.)

Children have not been given to parents as a present, which they may dispose of as they please, but as a trust, for which, if lost through their negligence they must render an account to God.

The Scripture tells us, that when a father observes the divine law, both he and his children shall prosper. "That it may be well with thee and thy children after thee, when thou shalt do that which is pleasing in the sight of God." (Deut 12:25)

But when we find a son addicted to blasphemies, to obscenities and to theft, we have reason to suspect that such too was the character of the father: "For a man is known by his children." (Eccl 11:30)

3. Hence Origen says that on the day of the judgment parents will have to render an account for all the sins of their children. (Grig., Lib. 2, in Job.) Hence, he who teaches his son to live well shall die a happy and tranquil death: "He that teaches his son well ... when he died he was not sorrowful, neither was he confounded." (Eccl. 30: 3, 5) And he shall save his soul by means of his children; that is, by the virtuous education he has given them: "She shall be saved through child-bearing." (1 Tim. 2:15)

But, on the other hand, a very uneasy and unhappy death shall be the lot of those who have labored only to increase the possessions or to multiply the honors of their family. Or who have sought only to lead a life of ease and pleasure, but have not watched over the morals of their children. St. Paul says that such parents are worse than infidels: "But if any man hath not care of his own, and especially of those of his house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel." (1 Tim 5: 8)

"Were fathers or mothers to lead a life of piety and continual prayer, and to communicate every day, they should be damned if they neglected the care of their children,” says St. Chrysostom. “Certain parents paid less attention to their children than they do to their horses! How careful are they to see that their horses are fed and well trained! And they take no pains to make their children attend Catechism, hear Mass, or go to confession. We take more care of our asses and horses, than of our children." (Homily X., in Mt)

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Allowing television to a child is to deliver him to all the vices

4. If all fathers fulfilled their duty of watching over the education of their children, we should have but few crimes and few executions.

"By the bad education parents give to their offspring, they cause their children - says St. Chrysostom - to rush into many grievous vices; and thus they deliver them up to the hands of the executioner." (Sermon, XX., de divers.)

Hence, in Lacedemon, a parent, as being the cause of all the irregularities of his children, was justly punished for their crimes with greater severity than the children themselves.

Great indeed is the misfortune of the child that has vicious parents, who are incapable of forming their children in the fear of God, and who, when they see their children engaged in dangerous friendships and in quarrels, instead of correcting and chastising them, rather take compassion on them, and say: "What can be done? They are young; they must take their course."

Oh! What wicked maxims! What a cruel education! Do you hope that when your children grow up they shall become saints?

Listen to what Solomon says : "A young man, according to his way, even when he is old, he will not depart from it." (Prov 22: 6) A young man who has contracted a habit of sin will not abandon it even in his old age.

"His bones," says Job, "shall be filled with the vices of his youth, and they shall sleep with him in the dust." (Job 20: 11) When a young person has lived in evil habits, his bones shall be filled with the vices of his youth, so that he shall carry them with him to death. And the impurities, blasphemies and hatred to which he was accustomed in his youth shall accompany him to the grave, and shall sleep with him after his bones will be reduced to dust and ashes. It is very easy, when they are small, to train up children to habits of virtue; but, when they have come to manhood, it is equally difficult to correct them, if they have learned habits of vice.

Continued


-From St. Alphonsus Liguori, "On the Education of Children," Sermons of St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon 36, Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Vatican Radio Report

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  World’s biggest cultivated meat factory is being built in the U.S.
Posted by: Stone - 12-29-2022, 07:12 AM - Forum: General Commentary - No Replies

World’s biggest cultivated meat factory is being built in the U.S.
It will be able to produce 22 million pounds of cultivated meat annually.


BigThink.com [adapted] | December 25, 2022
  • Cultivated meat is produced by combining muscle cells, extracted from living animals, with substances that help the cells grow.
  • The mixture is then placed inside in a machine called a “bioreactor,” which provides the ideal conditions for the cells to multiply.
  • Because cultivated meat is molecularly identical to the kind that comes from whole animals, it has the same flavor. 
  • For cultivated meat to have any real impact on the meat industry, though, the companies making it need to get costs down — for instance, by scaling up production.

Israeli startup Believer Meats has begun construction on the world’s biggest cultivated meat factory — and once it’s up and running, the US-based facility will be able to produce at least 22 million pounds of meat annually.

The challenge: Cultivated meat is produced by combining muscle cells, extracted from living animals, with substances that help the cells grow. The mixture is then placed inside in a machine called a “bioreactor,” which provides the ideal conditions for the cells to multiply.

“With our new U.S. production center, we are one step closer to commercialization.”

Quote:Because cultivated meat is molecularly identical to the kind that comes from whole animals, it has the same flavor. That means it could allow us to stop raising and slaughtering animals for meat, which is both bad for the environment and arguably unethical, without giving up the taste of burgers and chicken.

For cultivated meat to have any real impact on the meat industry, though, the companies making it need to get costs down. That typically means scaling up production, and right now, many startups are still only producing their lab-grown meat in very small batches.

What’s new? Believer Meats (formerly Future Meats) is not one of those startups. In June 2021, it opened the world’s first industrial-scale cultivated meat factory, which it says is capable of producing more than 400,000 pounds of meat per year.

Now, the company is building a facility in Wilson, North Carolina, that will be able to produce 55 times as much meat.

“Our brand has continually proven our commitment to scale production technology and capacity, and with our new US production center, we are one step closer to commercialization,” said CEO Nicole Johnson-Hoffman.

Looking ahead: A company spokesperson told Freethink that Believer’s new 200,000-square-foot cultivated meat factory is projected to be operational by early 2023.

Even if Believer can meet that goal, though, it won’t be able to sell any of its cultivated meat in the US without first getting the greenlight from both the FDA and the USDA. So far, only one company (UPSIDE Foods) has surmounted that first hurdle, and no one has yet cleared both.

Still, Believer is investing $123.35 million into the facility — about a third of the $388 million it has raised over its lifetime — and that commitment suggests that it expects the US to be a major cultivated meat market in the not-so-distant future.

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  St. John Fisher's Prayer for Good and Holy Bishops
Posted by: Stone - 12-28-2022, 11:59 AM - Forum: Prayers and Devotionals - No Replies

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St. John Fisher was a Catholic bishop during the 16th century who was martyred by King Henry VIII.

In a sermon from 1508, St. John Fisher prayed for good and holy bishops, asking God to send the Church true shepherds.

Quote:Lord, according to Your promise that the Gospel should be preached throughout the whole world, raise up men fit for such work. The Apostles were but soft and yielding clay till they were baked hard by the fire of the Holy Ghost.

So, good Lord, do now in like manner again with Thy Church militant; change and make the soft and slippery earth into hard stone; set in Thy Church strong and mighty pillars that may suffer and endure great labors, watching, poverty, thirst, hunger, cold and heat; which also shall not fear the threatening of princes, persecution, neither death but always persuade and think with themselves to suffer with a good will, slanders, shame, and all kinds of torments, for the glory and laud of Thy Holy Name. By this manner, good Lord, the truth of Thy Gospel shall be preached throughout all the world.

Therefore, merciful Lord, exercise Thy mercy, show it indeed upon Thy Church.

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  Hungarian Archbishop: “The German Church Is Anti-Christ”
Posted by: Stone - 12-28-2022, 06:38 AM - Forum: Vatican II and the Fruits of Modernism - No Replies

Hungarian Archbishop: “The German Church Is Anti-Christ”

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gloria.tv | December 28, 2022

Retired Veszprém Archbishop Gyula Márfi, 79, Hungary, had to relocate from Veszprém to Szombathely in August because he had criticised plans for the "renovation" of his former cathedral that include the removal of a glass window of St Michael, put in by Bishop Bertalan Badalik OP (+1965) who was exiled by the communists. Márfi spoke to MagyarJelen.hu (December 25). Highlights

• “One of the most striking signs of the EU's anti-Christian ideology is the fact that its constitution speaks about Europe's Greco-Roman traditions and the [so called] Enlightenment but makes no mentioning of Christianity."

• Márfi believes that "Freemasons and Muslims" are joining forces to make Christianity disappear from Europe.

• He confirms that Christians also love homosexualists but "to make a cult of them is a mortal sin which is also against the laws of nature.“

• “The situation of the German Church is really disastrous."

• According to the German bishops it is not important whether Jesus was born or rose from the dead but whether he is born and rises "in you." Márfi calls this "absurd."

• "A significant number of German priests bless homosex pseudo-marriages, as well as cohabitation and life partnerships. This is no longer Christianity, it is anti-Christ."

• In a mixed society, individual loses their identity, culture, faith, language, they "become easily manipulated, which is ideal for the world's big business."

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  12 States Allow Home Equity 'Theft' Over Homeowners' Tax Payment Shortfalls
Posted by: Stone - 12-28-2022, 06:34 AM - Forum: General Commentary - No Replies

12 States Allow Home Equity 'Theft' Over Homeowners' Tax Payment Shortfalls, Study Says


ZH | DEC 27, 2022
Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Twelve states and the District of Columbia allow local governments and private investors to seize dramatically more than what is owed from homeowners who fall behind on property tax payments, according to a new report.

The practice, which Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) calls “home equity theft,” is documented in what the organization bills as the first national study aimed at exposing “the injustice of home equity theft through tax foreclosure.”

“Our findings are alarming,” PLF’s strategic research director, Angela Erickson, said in a statement.

“Home equity theft is robbing thousands of people of their homes and all the equity they’ve built. A system that allows governments and private investors to take more than what is owed creates a perverse incentive to work against the homeowner—not with the homeowner—to get the tax debt paid.”

Homeowners lost more than $777 million in life savings on more than 5,600 homes, based on their market value, in transactions that took place from 2014 to 2021. The true total is probably higher because statistics from New York state and some statistics from the other states studied were not available. On average, homeowners lost 86 percent of their equity, the study found.

Government entities, which often unload properties for a fraction of their market value, collected an estimated $26 million more than they were owed on about 1,300 homes. At the same time, private investors, who purchase tax liens, took in about $250 million more than what they were owed on about 2,600 homes.

Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, South Dakota, and the District of Columbia have laws on the books that let local governments and private investors “steal” substantial amounts of home equity from homeowners who are late on their property taxes, according to PLF.

Nine other states—Alaska, California, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, and Wisconsin—safeguard home equity in the foreclosure process but provide loopholes that permit governments or private entities to capture excess equity value that PLF says should belong to the homeowner.

These laws allow government officials and investors to take homes that have been in families for generations and leave some people homeless over tax debts that, in some cases, work out to less than 1 percent of their property’s value, according to PLF.

In one case, a county in Michigan seized a man’s house over an $8.41 underpayment, leaving him with nothing. The report notes that in the end, the homeowner prevailed when the Michigan Supreme Court determined that the county had acted unconstitutionally.

PLF takes the position that these so-called tax-and-take transactions violate the Fifth Amendment, which prevents the government from taking property without just compensation, and the Eighth Amendment, which bans excessive penalties.

Some government treasurers’ organizations, counties, and tax lien investors who “personally profit off the system in some of these states” are in favor of laws that lead to home equity theft, Christina Martin, a senior attorney at PLF, told The Epoch Times.

“Everybody else seems to be against it—groups on the left, right, [and] center,” she said.

“The vast majority of people seem to be against this. And most people actually have no idea this is even happening.”

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), an alliance of conservative lawmakers, is opposed to home equity theft. Laws should be changed to require surplus profits to be returned to a home’s prior owner after a “tax lien investor or county collects what it is due and any other debts or levies on the property are paid,” ALEC says.

The Epoch Times reached out to the Government Finance Officers Association, the National Governors Association, and the National Conference of State Legislatures for comment but had not received a reply from any of the three organizations as of press time.

PLF currently has three home equity theft-related petitions from homeowners pending before the Supreme Court, all of which are scheduled to be considered by the justices on Jan. 6, 2023.

Two are from Nebraska. One petition (pdf) is Fair v. Continental Resources, court file 22-160, and the other (pdf) is Nieveen v. Tax 106, court file 22-237. A petition (pdf), Tyler v. Hennepin County, court file 22-166, is from Minnesota.

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  Pope Francis says ex-pope Benedict is 'very sick', asks for prayers
Posted by: Stone - 12-28-2022, 06:08 AM - Forum: Pope Francis - Replies (1)

Pope Francis says ex-pope Benedict is 'very sick', asks for prayers

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Former pope Benedict ® is greeted by Pope Francis during a ceremony to mark his 65th anniversary of ordination to the priesthood at the Vatican June 28, 2016. Osservatore Romano/Handout via Reuters


VATICAN CITY, Dec 28 (Reuters) - Pope Francis asked for prayers for former pope Benedict on Wednesday, saying he is "very sick".

Francis made the surprise appeal at the end of his general audience, giving no details.

Benedict, 95, in 2013 became the first pope in some 600 years to resign. He has been living in the Vatican since then.

"I would like to ask all of you for a special prayer for Pope Emeritus Benedict, who, in silence, is sustaining the Church. Let us remember him. He is very sick, asking the Lord to console and sustain him in this witness of love for the Church, until the end," Francis said, speaking in Italian.

There was no immediate comment from the Vatican on the state of Benedict's health, and phone calls to his residence in the Vatican were not answered.

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  Geoengineering startup has begun releasing climate-tweaking particles into atmosphere
Posted by: Stone - 12-27-2022, 05:44 AM - Forum: General Commentary - No Replies

A startup says it’s begun releasing particles into the atmosphere, in an effort to tweak the climate
Make Sunsets is already attempting to earn revenue for geoengineering, a move likely to provoke widespread criticism.

MIT Technology Review | December 24, 2022

A startup claims it has launched weather balloons that may have released reflective sulfur particles in the stratosphere, potentially crossing a controversial barrier in the field of solar geoengineering.

Geoengineering refers to deliberate efforts to manipulate the climate by reflecting more sunlight back into space, mimicking a natural process that occurs in the aftermath of large volcanic eruptions. In theory, spraying sulfur and similar particles in sufficient quantities could potentially ease global warming.

It’s not technically difficult to release such compounds into the stratosphere. But scientists have mostly (though not entirely) refrained from carrying out even small-scale outdoor experiments. And it’s not clear that any have yet injected materials into that specific layer of the atmosphere in the context of geoengineering-related research.

That’s in part because it’s highly controversial. Little is known about the real-world effect of such deliberate interventions at large scales, but they could have dangerous side effects. The impacts could also be worse in some regions than others, which could provoke geopolitical conflicts.

Some researchers who have long studied the technology are deeply troubled that the company, Make Sunsets, appears to have moved forward with launches from a site in Mexico without any public engagement or scientific scrutiny. It’s already attempting to sell “cooling credits” for future balloon flights that could carry larger payloads.

Several researchers MIT Technology Review spoke with condemned the effort to commercialize geoengineering at this early stage. Some potential investors and customers who have reviewed the company’s proposals say that it’s not a serious scientific effort or a credible business but more of an attention grab designed to stir up controversy in the field.

Luke Iseman, the cofounder and CEO of Make Sunsets, acknowledges that the effort is part entrepreneurial and part provocation, an act of geoengineering activism.

He hopes that by moving ahead in the controversial space, the startup will help drive the public debate and push forward a scientific field that has faced great difficulty carrying out small-scale field experiments amid criticism.

“We joke slash not joke that this is partly a company and partly a cult,” he says.

Iseman, previously a director of hardware at Y Combinator, says he expects to be pilloried by both geoengineering critics and researchers in the field for taking such a step, and he recognizes that “making me look like the Bond villain is going to be helpful to certain groups.” But he says climate change is such a grave threat, and the world has moved so slowly to address the underlying problem, that more radical interventions are now required.

“It’s morally wrong, in my opinion, for us not to be doing this,” he says. What’s important is “to do this as quickly and safely as we can.”


Wildly premature

But dedicated experts in the field think such efforts are wildly premature and could have the opposite effect from what Iseman expects.

“The current state of science is not good enough … to either reject, or to accept, let alone implement” solar geoengineering, wrote Janos Pasztor, executive director of the Carnegie Climate Governance Initiative, in an email. The initiative is calling for oversight of geoengineering and other climate-altering technologies, whether by governments, international accords or scientific bodies. “To go ahead with implementation at this stage is a very bad idea,” he added, comparing it to Chinese scientist He Jiankui’s decision to use CRISPR to edit the DNA of embryos while the scientific community was still debating the safety and ethics of such a step. 

Shuchi Talati, a scholar in residence at American University who is forming a nonprofit focused on governance and justice in solar geoengineering, says Make Sunset’s actions could set back the scientific field, reducing funding, dampening government support for trusted research, and accelerating calls to restrict studies.

The company’s behavior plays into long-held fears that a “rogue” actor with no particular knowledge of atmospheric science or the implications of the technology could unilaterally choose to geoengineer the climate, without any kind of consensus around whether it’s okay to do so—or what the appropriate global average temperature should be. That’s because it’s relatively cheap and technically simple to do, at least in a crude way.

David Victor, a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego, warned of such a scenario more than a decade ago. A “Greenfinger, self-appointed protector of the planet … could force a lot of geoengineering on his own,” he said, invoking the Goldfinger character from a 1964 James Bond movie, best remembered for murdering a woman by painting her gold.

Some observers were quick to draw parallels between Make Sunsets and a decade-old incident in which an American entrepreneur reportedly poured a hundred tons of iron sulfate into the ocean, in an effort to spawn a plankton bloom that could aid salmon populations and suck down carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Critics say it violated international restrictions on what’s known as iron fertilization, which were in part inspired by a growing number of commercial proposals to sell carbon credits for such work. Some believe it subsequently stunted research efforts in field. 

Pasztor and others stressed that Make Sunset’s efforts underscore the urgent need to establish broad-based oversight and clear rules for responsible research in geoengineering and help determine whether or under what conditions there should be a social license to move forward with experiments or beyond. As MIT Technology Review first reported, the Biden administration is developing a federal research plan that would guide how scientists proceed with geoengineering studies.


Balloon launches

By Iseman’s own description, the first two balloon launches were very rudimentary. He says they occurred in April somewhere in the state of Baja California, months before Make Sunsets was incorporated in October. Iseman says he pumped a few grams of sulfur dioxide into weather balloons and added what he estimated would be the right amount of helium to carry them into the stratosphere.

He expected they would burst under pressure at that altitude and release the particles. But it’s not clear whether that happened, where the balloons ended up, or what impact the particles had, because there was no monitoring equipment on board the balloons. Iseman also acknowledges that they did not seek any approvals from government authorities or scientific agencies, in Mexico or elsewhere, before the first two launches.

“This was firmly in science project territory,” he says, adding: “Basically, it was to confirm that I could do it.”

A 2018 white paper raised the possibility that an environmental, humanitarian, or other type of group could use this simple balloon approach to carry out a distributed, do-it-yourself geoengineering scheme.

In future work, Make Sunsets hopes to increase the sulfur payloads, add telemetry equipment and other sensors, eventually move to reusable balloons, and publish data following the launches.

The company is already attempting to earn revenue from the cooling effects of future flights. It is offering to sell $10 “cooling credits” for releasing one gram of particles in the stratosphere—enough, it asserts, to offset the warming effect of one ton of carbon for one year.


“What I want to do is create as much cooling as quickly as I responsibly can, over the rest of my life, frankly,” Iseman says, adding later that they will deploy as much sulfur in 2023 as “we can get customers to pay us” for.

The company says it has raised $750,000 in funding from Boost VC and Pioneer Fund, among others, and that its early investors have also been purchasing cooling credits. The venture firms didn’t respond to inquiries from MIT Technology Review before press time.


'A terrible idea'

Talati was highly critical of the company’s scientific claims, stressing that no one can credibly sell credits that purport to represent such a specific per gram outcome, given vast uncertainty at this stage of research.

“What they’re claiming to actually accomplish with such a credit is the entirety of what’s uncertain right now about geoengineering,” she says.

Kelly Wanser, executive director of SilverLining, a nonprofit that supports research efforts on climate risks and potential interventions like geoengineering, agreed.

“From a business perspective, reflective cooling effects and risks cannot currently be quantified in any meaningful way, making the offering a speculative form of ‘junk credit’ that is unlikely to have value to climate credit markets,” she wrote in an email.

Talati adds that it’s hypocritical for Make Sunsets to assert they’re acting on humanitarian grounds, while moving ahead without meaningfully engaging with the public, including with those who could be affected by their actions.

“They’re violating the rights of communities to dictate their own future,” she says.

David Keith, one of the world’s leading experts on solar geoengineering, says that the amount of material in question—less than 10 grams of sulfur per flight—doesn’t represent any real environmental danger; a commercial flight can emit about 100 grams per minute, he points out. Keith and his colleagues at Harvard University have worked for years to move forward on a small-scale stratospheric experiment known as SCoPEx, which has been repeatedly delayed.

But he says he’s troubled by any effort to privatize core geoengineering technologies, including patenting them or selling credits for the releases, because “commercial development cannot produce the level of transparency and trust the world needs to make sensible decisions about deployment,” as he wrote in an earlier blog post.

Keith says a private company would have financial motives to oversell the benefits, to downplay the risks, and to continue selling its services even as the planet cools to lower than preindustrial temperatures.

“Doing it as a startup is a terrible idea,” he says.

For its part, the company says it’s operating on the best modeling research available today, and that it will adjust its practices as it learns more and hopes to collaborate with nations and experts to guide these efforts as it scales up.

“We are convinced solar [geoengineeering] is the only feasible path to staying below 2 ˚C [of warming over preindustrial levels], and we will work with the scientific community to deploy this life-saving tool as safely and quickly as possible,” Iseman said in an email.

But critics stress that the time to engage with experts and the public would have been before the company began injecting material into the stratosphere and trying to sell cooling credits—and that it’s likely to face an icy reception from many of those parties now.

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  Four substations attacked in Washington state, leaving thousands without power
Posted by: Stone - 12-27-2022, 05:36 AM - Forum: General Commentary - No Replies

Four substations attacked in Washington state, leaving thousands without power
Power appears to have been restored to many of those left in the dark after electricity infrastructure in the Tacoma area was vandalized.


NBC News | Dec. 25, 2022, 8:32 PM EST / Updated Dec. 26, 2022, 5:19 PM EST

Four electricity substations in the Tacoma, Washington, area were attacked Sunday, affecting thousands of customers, authorities said.

The Pierce County Sheriff’s Department described the early morning attacks on two Tacoma Public Utilities substations and a Puget Sound Energy facility as acts of vandalism, with those responsible unidentified.

"It is unknown if there are any motives or if this was a coordinated attack on the power systems," the sheriff’s department said in a statement.

The agency estimated that the number of affected homes and businesses was 14,000 at one point Sunday, when three substations were affected.

The sheriff's department described a fourth incident Sunday about 7:21 p.m. at another Puget Sound Energy substation.

"The suspect(s) gained access to the fenced area and vandalized the equipment which caused the fire," the sheriff’s office said in a statement. "There are no suspects in custody at this time."

The fourth incident at a utility substation in South Pierce County on Christmas Day prompted stepped-up security.

"All law enforcement agencies in the county have been notified of the incidents and will be monitoring power substations in their area," the statement said.

Power was restored to most of the affected homes, the sheriff's department said.

Puget Sound Energy confirmed in a statement Monday that two of its substations were attacked.

"We are coordinating with authorities on suspected acts of vandalism at two of our substations. Both incidents are under investigation and no further details are available. PSE has extensive measures to monitor, protect and minimize the risk to our equipment and infrastructure," the statement said.

Puget Sound Energy said on its website Sunday that more than 1,200 customers were without power — with the vast majority having been reconnected — but it wasn't clear whether that was connected to the attack.

Tacoma Public Utilities said that more than 7,000 of its customers in the communities of Graham and Elk Plain were without power Sunday and that it continued to work on restoration.

It appears that electricity for many of those TPU customers has been restored — the national blackout tracker PowerOutage.us reported late Sunday afternoon that fewer than 5,000 customers remained in the dark across the state.

In a statement, TPU said, "Two of our substations were deliberately targeted by physical attacks."

The sheriff's department said a person or people broke into facilities and vandalized equipment in each of those attacks, the first of which was reported at 2:39 a.m.

TPU said federal law enforcement alerted it this month to the possibility of attacks and recommended a security assessment. It wouldn't say what measures, if any, it took.

At the same time, Oregon Public Broadcasting and KUOW public radio of Seattle reported that separate attacks on six substations operated by Portland General Electric, the Bonneville Power Administration, the Cowlitz County Public Utility District and Puget Sound Energy in Washington and Oregon had taken place mid-November. The incidents are alleged to have included breaches of utility properties, the outlets said.

On Dec. 3, vandals attacked two Duke Energy substations in Moore County, North Carolina, leaving 45,000 customers in the dark for more than three days, officials said. People with guns opened fire and, in one case, breached a facility, they said, and they remained outstanding nearly a month later.

As electricity was restored to the last of the North Carolina customers Dec. 7, someone opened fire near a Duke Energy hydro facility in Ridgeway, South Carolina, about 130 miles south of Moore County. Federal investigators were comparing ballistics evidence in both attacks to determine whether they were connected.

Investigators probing the North Carolina attacks were looking at online conspiracy theories to determine whether any played a role, two senior law enforcement officials briefed on the matter said this month.

A prevailing theory was that the outages were intended to shut down a drag performance, "Downtown Divas," at Sunrise Theater in Southern Pines, North Carolina. Anti-LGBTQ demonstrators targeted the location in the days leading up to the Saturday night event, which continued in the dark before it ended early.

Power infrastructure has long been on the attack wish list of white supremacists and other right-wing extremists who seek American "destabilization," Brian Levin, the director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, said in February.

Early this year, three men pleaded guilty in connection with a plot to disrupt the electricity grid, sow civil unrest and economic uncertainty, and ultimately trigger a race war, federal prosecutors said at the time.

There's no indication the Washington, Oregon and Carolinas attacks shared similar motives. Sunday's Tacoma-area attacks remained under investigation.

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  Scientists Develop Gelatinous Robots To Crawl Through Human Body To Deliver Medical Payloads
Posted by: Stone - 12-27-2022, 05:31 AM - Forum: Health - No Replies

Scientists Develop Gelatinous Robots To Crawl Through Human Body To Deliver Medical Payloads, Diagnose Illnesses

[Image: The-Johns-Hopkins-University-700x420.jpg?itok=bJxM8njB]

ZH | DEC 23, 2022
Authored by Bryan Jung via The Epoch Times,


Scientists have developed miniature gelatinous robots that can crawl through the human body to deliver medicine or diagnose illnesses.

The “gelbot” is powered by little more than temperature changes, and its innovative design, which resembles an inchworm, is one of the most promising concepts in the field of soft robotics, according to Jill Rosen of John Hopkins University.

Quote:“It seems very simplistic, but this is an object moving without batteries, without wiring, without an external power supply of any kind—just on the swelling and shrinking of gel,” said David Gracias, a professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Johns Hopkins University and a senior project leader.

“Our study shows how the manipulation of shape, dimensions, and patterning of gels can tune morphology to embody a kind of intelligence for locomotion.”

The 3D-printed robot, which is made out of gelatin, is intended to replace pills or intravenous injections, which could cause problematic side effects.

The prototype was announced in the journal Science Robotics, on Dec. 14.


Gelbot May Revolutionize Medicine in the 21st Century

Compared to most robots that are made out of hard materials like metals or plastics, the revolutionary “gelbot” consists an innovative water-based gel which feels like a gummy bear, making it more suitable for its task.

The team at John Hopkins said that the gels can “swell or shrink” in response to temperature, in order to be used to “create smart structures,” and they were able to demonstrate how they could move the jelly-like robots forward and backward on flat surfaces and maneuver them in certain directions, with an undulating, wave-like motion.

Gracias envisions the medical devices crawling through a patient’s body to deliver medication to a tumor, blood clot, or an infection directly, while not disturbing healthy tissue.

Unlike swallowed tablets or injected liquids, which have a time delayed effect, the tiny robot could hold back a dose of medicine and then immediately inject it when it reaches its target.

The researchers foresee the “gelbot” revolutionizing how doctors examine their patients by working as minimally invasive devices to assist with diagnoses and treatments.

Gracias is also planning to program the robots to crawl in response to variations in human biomarkers and biochemicals and test other worm and marine organism-inspired designs, along with the addition of cameras and sensors to their bodies.

He further plans to use the “gelbot” for other purposes such as marine exploration, or to patrol and monitor the ocean’s surface to fight maritime pollution.


Other Research Teams Are Working on Similar Robotic Designs

The team at John Hopkins are not the only ones looking to come up with a miniature medical robot device.

Two and a half years ago, researchers at Cornell University announced a project to develop tiny microscopic machines with legs that could move inside a patient to deliver drugs or assist with diagnoses like the “gelbot.”

This design, utilizing a mini-computer, was able to move via laser impulses and was small enough to live next to microorganisms that already lived inside a human body.

Quote:“The new robots are about 5 microns thick (a micron is one-millionth of a meter), 40 microns wide, and range from 40 to 70 microns in length,” said the Cornell report.

“Each bot consists of a simple circuit made from silicon photovoltaics—which essentially functions as the torso and brain—and four electrochemical actuators that function as legs.”

Meanwhile, another team at Stanford University earlier this year revealed a “Transformers-style robot” inspired by Japanese origami, the New York Post reported.

The “millibot,”much like the “gelbot,” is designed to carry medical payloads directly to a tumor, blood clot, or infection to dispense drugs or investigate a patient’s inner workings, said Dr. Ruike Zhao, one of the project’s co-leaders.

Zhao claims that the “spinning-enabled wireless amphibious origami millirobot” is “the most robust and multifunctional robot we have ever developed,”  and that it “has broad potential application in the biomedical field.”

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  The Christmas Sword
Posted by: Stone - 12-26-2022, 07:57 AM - Forum: Resources Online - Replies (1)

The Christmas Sword

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The Catholic State | December 24, 2022


The masculine equivalent of the “Golden Rose” is the Sword blessed by the Pope at Christmas, and, from time to time, presented to the most valiant princes.

Commonly bestowed during the 15th/ 16th centuries in gratitude for saving Europa from Mohammedan invaders, the Holy Father charged the recipient: “You are a fortification and bulwark to protect the holy Roman Church against the enemies of the Faith. Therefore, may your hand remain firm against the enemies of the Holy See and of the name of Christ, and may your right hand be lifted up, intrepid warrior, as you remove them from the earth.”


Clothed in surplice and cope, the prince would then chant the 5th lesson at Matins, a Christmas sermon of Leo the Great: “When our Lord entered the field of battle against the devil, He did so with a great and wonderful fairness. Being Himself the Almighty, He laid aside His uncreated Majesty to fight with our cruel enemy in our weak flesh…”

Before chanting this lesson, the prince unsheathed the sword, struck it against the ground three times, then brandished it in the air, again three times, and replaced it in the scabbard.

The first blessed sword was given to Charlemagne’s father in AD 758. The most recent one was presented to the last Dauphin of France in 1823. The next one (Deo volente) will be presented to the Great Monarch when the Invaders & the Perfidious are finally purged from Europa and the Earth itself.

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  A Christmas Message from Archbishop Viganò
Posted by: Stone - 12-25-2022, 11:11 AM - Forum: Archbishop Viganò - No Replies

A Christmas Message from Archbishop Viganò
[Taken from here.]


Rex pacificus magnificatus est, cujus vultum desiderat universa terra.[1]

The whole earth desires to contemplate the blessed face of the King of peace, who deigned to be born according to the flesh, two thousand twenty-two years ago, to redeem us from the yoke of Satan and acquire us for the glory of heaven with His most holy Passion.

For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end, upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this (Is 9: 6-7). These solemn words, referring to the coming Redeemer, spur us on to recognize the sign of sovereignty and to cooperate so that peace, which is stability of order, founded on law and justice, may triumph.

In this world that is rebellious and indocile to the Child King; in this world that deludes itself that it can build peace without the One who is its eternal foundation, may each of you bear witness to Faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ with courage and coherence of life, offering Him your heart as a mystical manger in which He can rest, as a throne in which He sits and reigns first and foremost over you, your families, and your community.

In this world that is rebellious and indocile to the Child King; in this world that deludes itself that it can build peace without the One who is its eternal foundation, may each of you bear witness to Faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ with courage and coherence of life, offering Him your heart as a mystical manger in which He can rest, as a throne in which He sits and reigns first and foremost over you, your families, and your community. May your actions and your words make the blessed Face of the Lord shine forth, so that all the peoples of the earth may convert to Him, bend their knees to Him in adoration, and restore to Him the royal crown that the Revolution snatched from Him.

And so may it be.

+ Carlo Maria, Archbishop
Most Holy Christmas MMXXII

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