By Rev. George W. Rutler
That the film about the Cristero Rebellion, For Greater Glory,
has been news to many and highlights the appalling ignorance of history in
our culture. That isolation from the human experience has made it easy
to confuse conscience with emotion and think religion is irrational.
George Neumayer has written, “In one of his memoirs, Obama uses the Old
Testament story of Abraham and Isaac to argue that secularism equals
“reason” and religion equals crazy caprice.”
Such was the distillation of President Obama’s commencement speech at
Notre Dame University in which he said, “It is beyond our capacity as
human beings to know with certainty what God has planned for us or what
He asks of us…” Fast forward and the same university has joined a legal
action against the consequences of the presidential speechwriter’s
half-baked Kantianism.
If Fidel Castro is the unwitting founder of modern Miami, so Barrack
Obama may be remembered for unintentionally energizing the Catholic
bishops. He may even have brought some of Europe to a more sober frame
of mind about his policies. The throngs in European cities welcoming the
advent of Hope and Change during his campaign were unsettling enough
for anyone who remembers the cheering crowds gathered in some of those
same platzes in the 1930’s. In short order, the Nobel Peace Prize became
the Nobel Promise Prize when it was awarded to someone who was expected
to do great things even if he had not done so already. L’Osservatore Romano
was pleased that the new president might bring an end to Reagan’s
“neocon revolution” and hailed this election as “a choice that unites.”
