What will the New Year bring?

One thing we may have to cope with is a kiddies’ story book by Australia’s Prime Minister, Mr Kevin Rudd.

It is about the PM’s cat and dog. It will be published later this month.

Why?

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This project must be considered a vote-catcher, an image-softener.

Media-aware prime ministers know there’s more political mileage in being a celebrity than in facing moral issues.

Children are being exploited as part of this – being brainwashed again – taught how not to think — certainly not to think about God.

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Children are uneasily aware that things are going wrong in the world.

Like their TV-watching parents, they are being fed a never-ending series of panic-inducing sideshows to be anxious about.

Global warming (man-made and man-fixable)

Pandemics (spread by humans, preventable by human-invented vaccinations)

Economic crises (caused by human greed, fixable by human-stimulated spending-sprees)

Because rational creatures can’t be convinced by such yarns, it’s politically important to prevent creatures being rational.

Adults succumb best to violence, sport and pornography.

Children, up to a certain age, still fall for cuteness and Prime Ministers who can speak, not only Mandarin, but also baby-talk.

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When things go wrong in the world we should be looking to the primary Cause (God), not just airbrushing the secondary causes.

Children are capable of understanding that there is a God who rules the universe and who loves us — and that we should spend our lives seeking, not just to “feel good” and “look good”, but in trying to please God by being good and showing him by our lives that we love him.

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God has put the Catholic Church into the world to lead us, adults and children, into union with him through the Sacraments of the Church.

God wants to dwell in your soul (your intellect and your will).

That is what we need to focus on and talk to our children about.

Just when you thought television couldn’t get any more stupid or perverse, along comes news of  the 2010 version of “Celebrity Big Brother” in the UK, starting next Sunday.

Its theme is  “Hell”. Executive Producer, Shirley Jones, says the notion of Hell “inspired much of what we have done to the house, particularly the entrance which is dark and cavernous with flaming walls”.

She also said, “Hell is other people, and everyone has a different idea of hell . . .”

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What the series will NOT be about is whether Hell exists – not just as an idea, but something real, eternal, with burning, screaming, hatred, remorse, pain and despair.

 And whether there is some way of escaping it.

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There is no doubt that Christians are obliged to believe in Hell.

Jesus himself taught, “Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who is able to destroy both body and soul in Hell.”

Our Lord also taught how he intends people to avoid Hell.

In Saint John’s gospel, he told the apostles at the Last Supper, “Receive the Holy Ghost. Whoever’s sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins you shall retain, they are retained.”

This is Jesus giving his first Catholic priests, the 12 apostles, the role of forgiving sinners who repent and make their confession to their priest.

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What if Hell did not exist?

If Hell did not exist, we would not exist as real people.

Life would be meaningless. What we chose to do in this life would have no meaning — no effect on anything, including our eventual future fate.

We would be mere robots.

Originally the word “avatar” meant the earthly appearance or embodiment or incarnation of a Hindu god.

Then it came to be used for an electronic image that represents and is manipulated by a computer-game player.

Now there’s a film called “Avatar” — which some claim to be a quantum leap forward in Cinema.

Is it?

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While one reviewer calls it “a cultural milestone”, another labels it “uniquely awful . . .  the worst movie I have ever seen”.

All of which tells you it is probably about average.

Its “M” rating assures us that there will be unnecessary nudity, stomach-turning violence and, of course, the irreverent use of the names of God and Jesus Christ.

People who seem to be white Anglo-Saxon protestants – and if this film has a message at all, it is that we should loathe white Anglo-Saxons —  are the enemies whom we are to despise, because they plan to loot and exploit planet Pandora in the same way whites have done and do on earth. Ho hum.

The violence and the semi-human spooks are nightmare material for children. Believe me, no little kid seeing this film will ever forget it. Somewhere in his brain he will not be the same. But does anybody care?

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Many people are going to see this film, and more will.

Why? Because they are bored out of their minds, and it numbs the pain for a while to witness, and be entertained by, irreverence against something . . . anything.

They also like inventive animation.

If this society of ours had any respect, nobody would attend — simply because of the blasphemy alone.

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