The Snuson Confessional Sacristy & Bulletin

[Snusdog]

Most recent addition to the church arsenal...
TAURUS 85NV 38 SPECIAL

Ain't so new......

Beecher Bibles
The Sharps rifle was a big innovation in firearms during the 1850s. It was highly sought after by men looking to gain political advantage in territorial Kansas. The unique weapon with its patented breech-loading and self-priming features offered quick loading, speed in firing, and accuracy in distance. Early in 1856, the Sharps rifle picked up a new nickname. In a highly visible article on the Kansas conflict, abolitionist preacher Henry Ward Beecher recommended the effective weapon as a tool to fight slavery.

He (Henry W. Beecher) believed that the Sharps Rifle was a truly moral agency, and that there was more moral power in one of those instruments, so far as the slaveholders of Kansas were concerned, than in a hundred Bibles. You might just as well. . . read the Bible to Buffaloes as to those fellows who follow Atchison and Stringfellow; but they have a supreme respect for the logic that is embodied in Sharp's rifle.

This article appeared in the New York Tribune on February 8, 1856, and rapidly thereafter the Sharps rifle became known as a "Beecher's Bible."

[wa3zrm]

PP and his friends!!!

[Premium Parrots]

[wa3zrm]

Homily On Christmas Morning

BEHOLD a new and wondrous mystery. My ears resound to the Shepherds song, piping no soft melody, but chanting full forth a heavenly hymn. The Angels sing. The Archangels blend their voice in harmony. The Cherubim hymn their joyful praise. The Seraphim exalt His glory. All join to praise this holy feast, beholding the Godhead here on earth, and man in heaven. He Who is above, now for our redemption dwells here below; and he that was lowly is by divine mercy raised.


Bethlehem this day resembles heaven; hearing from the stars the singing of angelic voices; and in place of the sun, enfolds within itself on every side, the Sun of justice. And ask not how: for where God wills, the order of nature yields. For He willed, He had the power, He descended, He redeemed; all things yielded in obedience to God. This day He Who is, is Born; and He Who is, becomes what He was not. For when He was God, He became man; yet not departing from the Godhead that is His. Nor yet by any loss of divinity became He man, nor through increase became He God from man; but being the Word He became flesh, His nature, because of impassability, remaining unchanged.


And so the kings have come, and they have seen the heavenly King that has come upon the earth, not bringing with Him Angels, nor Archangels, nor Thrones, nor Dominations, nor Powers, nor Principalities, but, treading a new and solitary path, He has come forth from a spotless womb. Since this heavenly birth cannot be described, neither does His coming amongst us in these days permit of too curious scrutiny. Though I know that a Virgin this day gave birth, and I believe that God was begotten before all time, yet the manner of this generation I have learned to venerate in silence and I accept that this is not to be probed too curiously with wordy speech. For with God we look not for the order of nature, but rest our faith in the power of Him who works.


What shall I say to you; what shall I tell you? I behold a Mother who has brought forth; I see a Child come to this light by birth. The manner of His conception I cannot comprehend.


Nature here rested, while the Will of God labored. O ineffable grace! The Only Begotten, Who is before all ages, Who cannot be touched or be perceived, Who is simple, without body, has now put on my body, that is visible and liable to corruption. For what reason? That coming amongst us he may teach us, and teaching, lead us by the hand to the things that men cannot see. For since men believe that the eyes are more trustworthy than the ears, they doubt of that which they do not see, and so He has deigned to show Himself in bodily presence, that He may remove all doubt. Christ, finding the holy body and soul of the Virgin, builds for Himself a living temple, and as He had willed, formed there a man from the Virgin; and, putting Him on, this day came forth; unashamed of the lowliness of our nature. For it was to Him no lowering to put on what He Himself had made. Let that handiwork be forever glorified, which became the cloak of its own Creator. For as in the first creation of flesh, man could not be made before the clay had come into His hand, so neither could this corruptible body be glorified, until it had first become the garment of its Maker.


What shall I say! And how shall I describe this Birth to you? For this wonder fills me with astonishment. The Ancient of days has become an infant. He Who sits upon the sublime and heavenly Throne, now lies in a manger. And He Who cannot be touched, Who is simple, without complexity, and incorporeal, now lies subject to the hands of men. He Who has broken the bonds of sinners, is now bound by an infants bands. But He has decreed that ignominy shall become honor, infamy be clothed with glory, and total humiliation the measure of His Goodness.


For this He assumed my body, that I may become capable of His Word; taking my flesh, He gives me His spirit; and so He bestowing and I receiving, He prepares for me the treasure of Life. He takes my flesh, to sanctify me; He gives me His Spirit, that He may save me.


Come, then, let us observe the Feast. Truly wondrous is the whole chronicle of the Nativity. For this day the ancient slavery is ended, the devil confounded, the demons take to flight, the power of death is broken, paradise is unlocked, the curse is taken away, sin is removed from us, error driven out, truth has been brought back, the speech of kindliness diffused, and spreads on every side, a heavenly way of life has been in planted on the earth, angels communicate with men without fear, and men now hold speech with angels.


Why is this? Because God is now on earth, and man in heaven; on every side all things commingle. He became Flesh. He did not become God. He was God. Wherefore He became flesh, so that He Whom heaven did not contain, a manger would this day receive. He was placed in a manger, so that He, by whom all things arc nourished, may receive an infants food from His Virgin Mother. So, the Father of all ages, as an infant at the breast, nestles in the virginal arms, that the Magi may more easily see Him. Since this day the Magi too have come, and made a beginning of withstanding tyranny; and the heavens give glory, as the Lord is revealed by a star.


To Him, then, Who out of confusion has wrought a clear path, to Christ, to the Father, and to the Holy Ghost, we offer all praise, now and for ever. Amen.

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Truck carrying pigs crashes on I-40 West; crews work to clean up mess

RALEIGH, N.C. - A tractor-trailer carrying 2,200 pigs crashed Tuesday morning along Interstate 40 West in south Raleigh, creating traffic delays in the area for hours, police said.
The wreck happened shortly after 10 a.m. between South Saunders Street and Lake Wheeler Road, forcing authorities to shut down the two right lanes of the highway. Police said the tractor-trailer lost control after a vehicle changed lanes in front of the

...
No serious injuries were reported in the wreck, police said, but some pigs were killed.

(Excerpt) Read more at wral.com ...

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KEYWORDS: pigs

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Microsoft to begin alerting users about suspected government snooping

Microsoft will warn email and OneDrive users if it detects apparent attempts by governments to hack into their accounts.
The rollout of the alert system on Wednesday follows reports Redmond had failed to warn Hotmail users targeted by Chinese hackers, according to former employees.
Reuters reports Microsoft was hacked in 2011 but failed to notify affected users, partly to avoid antagonising China, the suspected culprit. Targeted users were instead advised to pick new passwords without any particular reason being supplied at the time.
Google, Facebook, Twitter and Yahoo already offer similar government hacker alert systems to the one just introduced by Microsoft. Alerts are far from rare. Google, for example, reportedly tells tens of thousands of users every few months that they’ve been targeted by foreign spooks.
Redmond’s alerting system has raised issues about US data breach disclosure laws. “If China had stolen Hotmail users' passwords, Microsoft would have had to tell users,” Christopher Soghoian, a principal technologist at the ACLU, stated in an update to his personal Twitter account But *private emails* are not considered PII [personally identifiable information].

(Excerpt) Read more at theregister.co.uk ...

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The Pope

At last night's New Year's Eve gathering I got into a discussion over the poll that showed the Pope tied with Donald Trump for the second most admired person.
The Trump supporters were wildly happy about him being compared to a person of such high position. They felt it put in him into an almost exalted status and really reinforced their support.
The Catholics present, all very conservative, were saddened almost to the point of embarrassment that their leader, the very top person of the entire Catholic church couldn't get more votes than a NYC reality TV star. They felt it said a lot about his liberal, populist positions and how they undermined so many of the Church's traditional positions.
The discussion among the Catholics only had to be abandoned, possibly due to some social drinking. We never did come to a consensus on whether Trump should be more embarrassed by being compared to such a lefty, or the Pope should be more embarrassed by being compared to a trash talking TV personality.

[Burnsey]

http://www.gallup.com/poll/1678/most...man-woman.aspx

If you mean this one.......topping the list......

Obama
Francis/Trump
Bernie Sanders
Bill Gates
Ben Carson

"What a country!" - Yakov Smirnoff

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Sex toy biz gets rise out of New Yorkers with 'GuyFi' booth — aimed to 'relieve stress'
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS ^

They must be yanking our chain.
A sex toy company trying to get a rise out of New Yorkers erected a head-turning promotional ploy on Fifth Ave.
Hot Octopuss unveiled what it called a "GuyFi" booth on 28th St. and 5th Ave. where men could, in theory, go to "relieve stress" mid-workday.
The masturbation-themed marketing scheme was inspired by a Time Out survey, which concluded that 39% of the New York men questioned admitted to masturbating while at work.
The booth was created to "take this habit out of the office and into a more suitable environment designed to give the busy Manhattan man the privacy, and the high-speed Internet connection, he deserves," Octopuss said in a press release.
The booth was actually an out-of-service telephone kiosk outfitted with a black curtain, a folding chair, a laptop computer, and a Hot Octopuss ad along the side.
"At Hot Octopuss we are all about looking for new solutions to improve everyday life and we feel we've done just that with the new GuyFi booth, "Adam Lewis, Hot Octopuss co-founder, said in a statement. 'We hope the city's men enjoy using the space we've created in whatever way they want."
A representative later told Mashable Friday that, "the brand is not actively encouraging people to masturbate in public as that is an illegal offense."

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Maine Gov. Paul LePage: Bring back the guillotine for drug traffickers

Maine Gov. Paul LePage says his state is too easy on drug crimes, suggesting it should bring back the guillotine for serious offenders.
The Republican governor, known for his controversial statements, was speaking on local radio Tuesday about combating the drug epidemic in his state.
"What I think we ought to do is bring the guillotine back," he told WMOV. "We could have public executions and have, you know, we could even have (guessing) which hole it falls in."

(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...

[Burnsey]

Paul LePage May Skip State Of The State Address Amid Talk Of Impeachment

"I'll send them a letter and we'll call it a day."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/...b086bc1cd600a8

Funny guy......

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Cannibalism Concerns Prompt Seattle Aquarium to Cancel Octopus Mating Session

The aquarium invites visitors to watch an octopus couple mating every year on Valentines Day, CNN affiliate KOMO reported. It canceled the event this year because it could not find a female octopus large enough for Kong.

The aquarium was concerned the 70-pound cephalopod could eat the creature it mates with, according to the affiliate. The female octopus available was about half his weight, forcing the aquarium to call off the sex session.

(Excerpt) Read more at ktla.com ...

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Church of Cheetah? Newspaper Suggests Chimp Religious Worship

Church of Cheetah Missouri Synod?

Perhaps not as ridiculous as it sounds according to the U.K. Independent. That newspaper suggests that chimpanzees tossing rocks at trees could be a primitive form of religous practice. They provide a video of this "ritual" but to your humble correspondent, it looks like nothing more than a bunch of dumb monkeys idly tossing rocks around. However, the idea of chimp worship is no more ridiculous than the Independent aping a lot of other news outlets last December when they published a story about how 2016 will be the HOTTEST YEAR ON RECORD. So rather than be branded a heretic, I shall now allow the Independent to make the case for pious chimps.

(Excerpt) Read more at newsbusters.org ...

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Earth’s “Magnetosphere” Collapsed in Space Today for Two+ Hours! Trouble Ahead for All of Us
BPEarthWatch ^

Earth’s “Magnetosphere” COLLAPSED in space TODAY for two+ hours! Trouble ahead for all of us
A stunning and terrifying event has taken place in space surrounding our planet; for two hours today, earth’s “Magnetosphere” COLLAPSED around the entire planet! The magnetosphere is what protects earth from solar winds and some radiation. EARTH’S MAGNETOSPHERE
Deep within the Earth, a fierce molten core is generating a magnetic field capable of defending our planet against devastating solar winds. The protective field, called the “magnetosphere” extends thousands of miles into space and its magnetism affects everything from global communication to animal migration and weather patterns. The magnetosphere is the region of space surrounding Earth where the dominant magnetic field is the magnetic field of Earth, rather than the magnetic field of interplanetary space. The magnetosphere is formed by the interaction of the solar wind with Earth’s magnetic field. This figure illustrates the shape and size of Earth’s magnetic field that is continually changing as it is buffeted by the solar wind.

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Catholic College Employee Investigated By Police For Saying There Are Only Two Genders

Blasphemy was committed on a Catholic university campus: An employee at the "Catholic" school stated her belief, rooted in Catholicism, that there are only two genders.
An unnamed employee at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles has been suspended and is currently being investigated for a “hate crime” by the university’s Bias Incident Response Team and the LAPD for “denying transgenderism” when she stated that there are only two genders, reports The College Fix.
On April 14, the employee engaged in a “dialogue” with three students who were hanging up posters for “Rainbow Week” on campus.
Cosette Carleo, who identifies as “gender-neutral,” said that she(?) was shaken to her “core” during the discussion. She told The Fix that the employee reiterated Roman Catholic teaching, stating “only two genders exist, male and female,” and that such a statement was a “hate crime.”
Carleo said, "'[Y]ou can have your opinion' as long as it doesn’t ‘deny my existence,’” notes The Fix....

(Excerpt) Read more at dailywire.com ...