Nope, have a destiny to fulfill...
The Pope has admitted that he wanted to retire 10 years ago to a scholarly life rather than leading the Roman Catholic Church. Benedict XVI, who had a distinguished academic career in Germany before moving to Rome, told a group of scholars that he had asked Pope John Paul II whether he could retire on his 70th birthday in 1997. However, John Paul II denied the then Cardinal Ratzinger his request, saying he was vital to the Church. "In his providential designs, the Lord had established different plans for me and here I am today among you, not as a passionate student of antique texts but as a shepherd called to encourage all the faithful to work together for the world's salvation."
[WAR: Believe it or not, I do feel sorry for B16 because his fate is already sealed - but somebody has to fulfill this end-time role.]
Doesn't matter - won't be another election...
The Vatican announced a change in rules for electing a pope on Tuesday by reinstituting the traditional requirement that two-thirds of the cardinals in the conclave agree on a candidate, no matter how long the process takes.
Cardinal Tauran says his appointment as president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue shows Benedict XVI's commitment to dialogue with Muslims. "I think it is a sign of the importance that the Pope gives to dialogue among religions, in particular with Islam. Therefore, he desired that this council recover its autonomy, in order to be a more effective instrument in the service of this dialogue among religions."
Some would see the Pope's interest in the old Mass as a matter of cultural taste. His desire for a wider use of the old rite in Latin is seen as something comparable to his interest in classical music. But this is a serious misunderstanding of Benedict's motivation. He is not concerned with Latin in itself. His respect for the "old Mass" is not a nostalgic cultural attachment to an ancient language. No, Benedict is concerned about the essence of the Mass itself. And what is that essence? The right worship of God.
President Köhler appears to be getting frustrated with his lack of political power and has proposed that presidents should in future be directly elected by the people. Media commentators say such a move would upset a political system that has served the nation well since 1949.
It's not the first time the Polish weekly Wprost has gotten in trouble in Germany. This week, the cover depicts Chancellor Merkel breast-feeding the Kaczynski twins. But it could have been worse, the editor-in-chief points out. At least they used a 21-year-old model.
The EU summit meeting just concluded in Brussels was a messy affair, but it did clarify a few matters. One is that there will be no "United States of Europe," at least any time soon. That's disappointing for those who had dreamed of a continental federation that could partner with (and yes, for some rival) the US. But it's also more unity than looked possible even a few months ago.
The accord is supposed to take the place of the failed European Constitution. Nothing remains in the present treaty of the vision of a politically unified Europe, which had been the justification for the original project for a European Constitution. The ugly face of the EU is revealed for what it really is—a grouping of capitalist cliques that quarrel, mutually extort each other, hurl wild insults at one another and only take their own interests into consideration.
The European Constitution has died in Brussels. The leaders of the EU met in the Belgian capital in an attempt to save it but concluded that the only reasonable solution was to adopt a scaled-down version, called the Constitutional Act.
Gordon Brown was under renewed pressure last night to call a referendum after the architect of the original EU constitution said the proposed treaty was essentially the same as the old one. Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the former French president, said the negotiating mandate agreed in Brussels at the weekend by Tony Blair and other leaders was a revival of the old constitution. It had simply become more "complicated", he said.
The hastily convened Sharm el-Sheik summit meeting was over in a matter of hours, but with enough to give officials an opportunity to present an upbeat picture. Never mind the participants' somber looks when their leaders read out their public statements.
Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has described the African Union as a failure and vowed to press ahead with plans for a single African government.
If Ahmadinejad is a genocidal maniac who just wants to kill Jews, then why are there 20,000 Jews in Iran with a member of parliament in Tehran?
Several petrol stations have been torched in the Iranian capital Tehran, after the government announced fuel rationing for private vehicles. Despite its huge energy reserves, Iran lacks refining capacity and it imports about 40% of its petrol.
Petrol consumption in Iran far outstrips the capacity of Iranian refineries, forcing Iran to import billions of dollars worth of petrol at international prices. It is then sold to the motorist at prices so heavily subsidised that a litre of fuel is cheaper than a litre of mineral water.
While US officials accuse Iran of arming a resurgent Taliban, officials here say the weapons are actually part of vast caches left behind by the Soviet army that fought a 9-year war in Afghanistan before withdrawing in 1988.
Wish I could agree...
Iran's Foreign Minister said the era of nuclear weapons has come to an end because it can neither bring about any changes nor settle any crisis.
But tell that to DC...
"I want to talk about the threat to world peace, and the possibility of a US attack, possibly a nuclear attack, on Iran. Even The New York Times is worried about it, and has reported on the split between the pro-war Vice-President's office and Condoleezza Rice's State Department . . . the plans are there, and they concern a lot of people within the Bush administration, who are leaking them. One thing the leaks show is that the plans are massive."
Gordon Brown tries all he can to avoid spending even one night in another European state. He dislikes the food, for one thing. But he seizes every opportunity to visit America, whether for work or on vacation. He loves the United States. He reads as many of the important political books published there as he can get his hands on.
For roughly a century, the US has had the world's biggest economy. One of its strengths has been its infrastructure. But as the US struggles to stay ahead of China, is its aging infrastructure slowing it down? In almost every area - from waterworks to bridges and dams, highways to mass transit - many experts have answered "yes."
When President Putin charged, in effect, that US plans to install missile defenses in Europe, were an extension to Europe of the Cheney-Bush offensive nuclear warfare doctrine, he was not speaking off the cuff. Under the Bush Administration, US nuclear doctrine has been undergoing radical redesign, to further the imposition of a new imperial order.
Norman Mineta made it clear to reporters - who verified his quotes in written text alongside him - that Mineta was indeed talking about a stand down order not to shoot down hijacked aircraft headed for the Pentagon. After no shoot down took place, it became clear that Cheney intended to keep NORAD fighter jets from responding - evidence that Cheney is guilty of treason, not negligence for allowing the Pentagon to be hit.
I sure hope not!...
That's what the 2007 Official Catholic Directory, due out this week, will say. But what about the dead, the double-counted and the disgruntled ex-Catholics — all of whose names may still plump up parish rolls?
It may come as a surprise to some, but Orthodox Jews too have a belief in a coming purgation. As the man popularly known as "America's Rabbi" told LifeSiteNews.com, we are "moving towards some kind of enormous, humanic and historic upheaval." While he rejects any attempt to fix a date on the coming upheaval, he does say that it is rapidly approaching. "What is unquestionably crystal clear is that time and history is accelerating. Things happen more quickly now than ever before so it is moving rapidly towards this event, whatever it will look like."
Policy makers at the Federal Reserve Board disagree with their own staff economists, and a growing chorus on Wall Street, who say the American economy cannot expand as fast as it used to without pushing up prices.
As we go to press, the creditors have rejected the Bear Stearns bailout plan, and Merrill Lynch is planing to sell some $800 million of bonds it has seized as collateral for loans it made. Rumors are flying that the two funds will be shuttered, sending shockwaves through the delicate CDO markets. The level of toxic waste hidden in the system has increased exponentially, just one of the many time bombs the bankers must defuse as they attempt to dry up the bubble without triggering a cataclysmic chain reaction.
The great danger of a financial crash today, is that most people, in what they call economics, believe actually not in economics: They believe in gambling. It's called a financial system. It's a gambling system. And we now have reached the point, the system is about to collapse.
Profit? How 'bout survive?!...
Schiff forecasts a stock market crash, the bursting of the real estate bubble, and the collapse of the dollar. For the first two of these, his reasons are the over-valuations of these asset classes, runaway credit expansion and the moral hazard created by bailouts. His argument for the collapse of the dollar is tied very closely to his view of the trade deficit.
The problem was (and is) that the greenbacks I'm unfortunately paid with are buying me fewer and fewer goods (which is, in effect, equivalent to receiving a concealed pay-cut for the same amount of backbreaking work after just one year). I felt very much like young Tom in Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, who finds himself in the hopeless position of working all day at a backbreaking job only to find that his meager wages will scarcely purchase enough food and gasoline to allow him to get to work the following day.
Venezuela's state-owned oil company is taking over multibillion-dollar projects owned by ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil. The action was being taken following a failure to agree the terms of a handover of operations in the oil-rich Orinoco belt.
Egyptologists say they have identified the 3,000-year-old mummy of Hatshepsut, Egypt's most famous female ruler. It is being billed as the biggest archaeological find in Egypt since the 1922 discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb.
WARrior Q&A
Q: Does not the following seem to state that the Sabbath was the same length as the days of creation? Or were each day of creation only the 12 hours in day type? Comment?: "For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it." (Exo 20:11).
A: It's quite elementary my dear Watson! Just look at the Hebrew and remember the very first thing revealed to man in Gen 1:3-5: what a "day" is ... "LIGHT"!! And "Elohim saw that the light was GOOD, and he SEPARATED the light from the darkness/night." LIGHT = DAY = GOOD
So just read Exo 20:11 as: "For in 6 lights the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the 7th light. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath light and made it holy."
This is as plain-as-day ... ;-) ... but we haven't been able to see it because of our vision being blurred by both the Roman/Papal and Babylonian/Jewish rendering of what a day is.
So if one believes in a sunset-to-sunset day, they're literally saying: "Each light starts at the end of the previous light just before dark." Now is this really logical? Where's the simplicity in this? To me, you just can't get any simpler than "light = day"!
And if you notice, darkness is not called "good" and nights are never mentioned again (except in verses 14-18 - to again show the distinction and separation between day and night). Why? Because He rested every night of the week - so the 7th night was no different from the previous 6 nights.
Yes, Friday night is the 7th NIGHT of the week, but so what! We are only commanded to remember/observe the 7th DAY! And just look at the Hebrew words for darkness and night - nothing positive, all negative connotation.
Also, remember what we're told about marriage: "Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate." (Mat 19:6). Well the reverse is also true: What God has separated, let man not join together!
He specifically separated light/day and dark/night for a reason - just like he separated the waters above from the ones below, not to be joined again. So why does man insist on joining them together in an unbiblical "24-hour day"?! WHY??!!
As the Encyclopedia Britannica mentions (as well as other sources) in their article on "Sabbath": The concept of a 24-hour day was unknown to the ancient Hebrews.
And the Ethiopians - the only other people/country to follow the Torah - anciently, and somewhat today, "have always drawn a sharp distinction between day and night ... (and their day) begins not, as in the West at midnight, but some 6 hours later, at dawn."
And once you realize what/when a "day" is, then a lot of calendar questions become mute and the pieces of the puzzle fall into place.
And postponements also become useless, since they were introduced because of food preparation. So a person is able to fix a meal during the night between a FriDAY Atonement and the Sabbath DAY - because the darkness/night is NOT holy time
There are only 2 nights in a year that have any meaning whatsoever: the night of the Passover and the night before the DAY of Atonement. (The appointed time of Atonement is during the 10th DAY, but we start the fast the evening before. This is opposed to the practice - like the Muslims - of eating before dawn and "fasting" until dark.)
Something else to think about: If the Sabbath DAY is the sign between God and his people, then this will eliminate the "Jews", Messianic "Jews", the SDAs, Branch Davidians, and all others who observe the Jewish Sabbath - saying they are spiritual Jews, but are not. (The Encyclopedia Britannica calls it the "Rabbinical Sabbath" and "Sabbath of the Scribes"!)
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