User talk:JASpencer/Archive1

See Also the Abuse page for more abusive postings.

Buttiglione in Mexico

Dear JASpencer, I noticed that you erased in its entirety an entry I made to the Rocco Buttiglione page regarding his role in the Mexican 2000 presidential elections. I am not sure if you are a specialist in Mexican elections or recent history (judging by your excellent contributions to Wiki, I assume you are more into religious history), but Buttiglione's role here was significant and has been recognized in books and articles. I was actually surprised that it had not yet appeared in Wiki. Please let me know why you deleted those comments, as they seem to contradict some of the Wiki protocol, such as the stated official policy (at least for the English sites) of "Be respectful to others and their points of view. This means primarily: Do not simply revert changes in a dispute. When someone makes an edit you consider biased or inaccurate, improve the edit, rather than reverting it." Thank you, Ariasking

Hi, as I can't find your user page I'll put the reasoning on Talk:Rocco Buttiglione. JASpencer 19:35, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I have read the Wiki BLP guidelines, and cannot find a reasonable argument to delte Buttiglione's role in the Mexican election. The one that vaguely comes close is the need to source, which can be done with no problem. The BLP states however that sourcing is required for potentially libelous or negative material. However, this caveat does not apply in this case. If you had something else in mind from the BLP, please let me know so I can implement it accordingly.

I can't see how interfering in a foreign election can be seen as anything other than negative. The policy is clear, the highest standards are required for sourcing information about living people. This information doesn't have a single citation. Reinsert by all means, but make sure that it's cited. JASpencer 21:40, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Welcome

Hello, JASpencer. Welcome to Wikipedia! If you have any questions, feel free to leave a message on my talk page or you can check the help files as most questions are answered there (the formatting you've used suggests you may already have). Regards, Notheruser 21:57 17 May 2003 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind words JASpencer

English Parish Histories (EPH)

We want Wikipedia to be an encyclopedia with our own content, not just a collection of links to other's content. That means that instead of having a huge list of links to off-site content (which can change/disappear and which we cannot edit) we want our own articles on the topics. So EPH could become a top level article, eplaining the topic in general while each link should point to our article which would probably be the appropriate place to put the external link in a designated link section, although could be made for retaining the external links in this form [[our parish history page]] [external link] -at least until our articles are all finished. This could become a large project. Hope this helps. Rmhermen 13:27, Jun 29, 2004 (UTC)

Islamic Invasion of India

Removed to the abuse page

Article Licensing

Hi, I've started a drive to get users to multi-license all of their contributions that they've made to either (1) all U.S. state, county, and city articles or (2) all articles, using the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike (CC-by-sa) v1.0 and v2.0 Licenses or into the public domain if they prefer. The CC-by-sa license is a true free documentation license that is similar to Wikipedia's license, the GFDL, but it allows other projects, such as WikiTravel, to use our articles. Since you are among the top 1000 Wikipedians by edits, I was wondering if you would be willing to multi-license all of your contributions or at minimum those on the geographic articles. Over 90% of people asked have agreed. For More Information:

• Multi-Licensing FAQ - Lots of questions answered
• Multi-Licensing Guide
• Free the Rambot Articles Project

To allow us to track those users who muli-license their contributions, many users copy and paste the "{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}" template into their user page, but there are other options at Template messages/User namespace. The following examples could also copied and pasted into your user page:

Option 1

I agree to [[Wikipedia:Multi-licensing|multi-license]] all my contributions, with the exception of my user pages, as described below:

{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}

OR

Option 2

I agree to [[Wikipedia:Multi-licensing|multi-license]] all my contributions to any [[U.S. state]], county, or city article as described below:

{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}

Or if you wanted to place your work into the public domain, you could replace "{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}" with "{{MultiLicensePD}}". If you only prefer using the GFDL, I would like to know that too. Please let me know what you think at my talk page. It's important to know either way so no one keeps asking. -- Ram-Man (comment| talk)

Your edits

Removed to the abuse page

Word deletions

When you were adding the East-West Schism category to a number of articles that weird deletion thing was happening again. Individual words, like death, dominant, etc, were deleted and replaced with spaces. Maybe it's a search & replace gone wrong? Whatever the cause, it's a pain to clean up. BTW, thanks for adding the lastname, firstname alphabetization on the category. Cheers, -Willmcw 23:11, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I was merely categorising, and not changing any words in the articles. JASpencer

I accept that it was unintentional. But if you check the 'diff' after on the edits, you'll find that words were getting omitted at the same time as you were categorizing. I can't explain how it could happen. But if you could check your work and either find what is causing the problem, or at least fixing it when it happens, then that would be a big help. Cheers, -Willmcw 20:54, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm not going to use the library computers to edit articles any more. The problems occured then. JASpencer

I've looked further and it seems to be a net nanny of some type on the public library computers that I'm using while away from work. I'll simply abstain from using those computers to edit Wikipedia.JASpencer

British Property bubble

Are you a property bull, as much of your "comments" felt very bullish, most if not all people feel that the bubble is about to pop soon. - 159753

No. I've actually Sold to Rent. Can't get much more bearish than that. JASpencer

Jesuit Alumni Page

Hello, thanks for the edit... I am just a bit sensitive that not all students of Jesuit institutions are Roman Catholics... there are a few on the list who aren't... can you think of a better category?--Timsj 17:27, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Your question on Humanae vitae talk page

Dear JAS, I've seen your question on the Humanae vitae talk page: "What's all that about" referring to Flamekeeper's rant. So if you haven't found out yourself: The thing is, he's a monomaniac that goes all over the place posting the same text everywhere, calling for a posthumous trial of Ludwig Kaas and Popes Pius XI and Pius XII for their alleged violation of the principle he cites from Humanae vitae in the case of the German Enabling act of 1933. This "robot posting" is already annoying on entries related to the Third Reich, it is completely non-sensical to post it on "Humanae vitae". Str1977 23:51, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Oh a nutter. Thanks JASpencer 12:16, 6 May 2005 (UTC)

Dear JAS, yes, you're right. And the situation is heating up. Could be so kind as to take a look into it. Battleground is mainly the Pius XII talk page, but he is all over the place, also on the "theology of Benedict XVI" page. Could you please answer the query I set up there. Thanks. Str1977 23:01, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

Do you have any expertise that can help ? Famekeeper 09:21, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

Sorry Flamekeeper I'm no psychiatrist but I'm sure if you ask around someone can suggest a good one. JASpencer 16:48, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

Dear JAS, as you have met him before you might be interested in this: Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Famekeeper. Str1977 20:04, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I've signed. By the way the link is Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Famekeeper JASpencer 13:00, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

Beit Jala

Why should Beit Jala belong to the Category Bethlehem? It is just a neighbouring town. Dbach 09:17, 16 May 2005 (UTC)

Fair enough. It was uncategorised and I sought to put it into a category. JASpencer 17:19, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

Category for Sacraments...suggestion

Could we rename the category "Seven Sacraments" simply "Sacraments"? Some traditions have more than seven, some fewer. KHM03 13:27, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

It's intended for use within the RCC category, so I'd prefer the seven sacraments. JASpencer 16:24, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

That's fine...we can always make a "Sacrament" category for ecumenical stuff. Thanks...KHM03 16:28, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

That sounds good. Thank you. JASpencer 16:28, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Basilicas

---

Re your page on North American Basilicas. You might add the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Brooklyn, New York, if only as a link. I'm pretty sure an article is going to be added about it; at least mention will be made of it in the "Sunset Park" article. I don't know how to edit a category page. --FourthAve 14:04, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

On further search, I discover there are duplicate category pages for Basilicas. yours: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Basilica_Churches and this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Basilicas Aggh. --FourthAve 14:37, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

There's no duplication intended. Basilica churches are for churches built in the basilica style - Basilicas is for the old fashioned (non-Christian) Roman basilicas and any other basilica based article.

Feel free to add the basilica to a category. I would do it but I think you'll probably get more out of it if you learn what's needed. Wikipedia:Categorization

JASpencer 17:07, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

• • The article on the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help (Brooklyn, New York) now exists. Someone else added the NA Basilica tag and it magically appears on your list. In the OLPH article, I left a wiki-ized bit for a future article for the "Cathedral Basilica of St. James (Brooklyn, New York)", along with an external link to it on the Diocesan pages.--FourthAve 19:55, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

Internal references to German Wiki articles

Since you were so nice to respond to me, I give you an interesting question.

How does one internally link an article from another-language Wiki into an English language one? This is the example. Look at my external link at the bottom of this page:

Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dubuque

And the link I unsuccessfully tried to link internally,

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erzbistum_Dubuque

I did it as an external link.

It was fun to learn that 'Archdiocese' translates to 'Erzbistum' in German.

Can it be done, internally, i.e., as a normal [open double brackets] blabla | blabla [close double brackets] bit?--FourthAve 04:51, 14 July 2005 (UTC)

I see it's all sorted on your talk page. Good. JASpencer 17:42, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

Catholicism and Masonry

Just looking for another opinion here, you seem to have been involved in this discussion before - I think I have found pretty much explicit info (see the discussion at Talk:Catholicism and Masonry) indicating that KofC members cannot join Masonic fraternities: SarekofVulcan disagrees, and keeps reverting edits. Could you take a look and give an opinion?DonaNobisPacem 08:59, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Catholic encyclopedia

First of all, a million thanks for creating the redirects for the "A"s. Most of the blue links there were created by user Hectorthebat who simply copy/pasted them from CE so they need wikifying and NPOV-ing. Wanna give it a try? Second - you created the Yellow Knives article as a simple redirection to itself. I presume it was haste, since you don't strike me as the vandal type. Care to do the article again? If not, I'll do it somewhere in the next days, no biggie. Dunemaire 22:54, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

That's the spirit. :) Dunemaire 23:00, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Glad to be of service. By the way is there any allocation of tasks for the Catholic Encyclopedia? --JASpencer 10:30, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Nope, none that I know of.Dunemaire 12:40, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Eminenti Apostolatus Specula

Greatings JASpencer,

I noticed that you have been involved in the above referenced page. Would you please add a translation for “aliisque de iustis ac rationabilibus causis Nobis notis” ... for those of us who do not speak latin. Otherwise, no quibbles. Thanks. Blueboar 18:22, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Err. I'm looking into it.

Mel Gibson

Here's an old clip of Mel Gibson that I thought might be a good entry to the Mel Gibson page.

http://www.evtv1.com/index.asp-itemnum-851

Links to Catholic encyclopedia

I've seen you've added a lot of links to this online encycloppedia, as well as creating a lot of redirects to articles that have these links. It looks unusual to me, is it really necessary to create a link to another encyclopedia for every one here? A sample of links I checked out seemed to have the same information in the wiki article as in the target,so it seems a little redundent to me. Plus, some articles are getting more than one link, and not in the normal external links section, which is worring as it looks indiscriminate. It also a little iffy, that many links so quickly to the same location, when the target has adverts "Get it here for only $29.95" at the top of every page. Comments? MartinRe 23:09, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Are you objecting to the Catholic Encyclopedia per se? You're comments aren't exactly clear here.JASpencer 23:19, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

No, not objecting to the Catholic Encyclopedia per se. I just don't see why so many links need to be created when the article it's linked from contains the same information as the target, which seems to be against [WP:EL]. Combine that with the fact that the target is advertising itself makes it look a spamming attack somewhat. MartinRe 23:29, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Fine. I'll put the Catholic Encyclopedia tag where there seems to be a copy from the CE.

On the allegation that I was trying to do this for gains from advertising revenue, I have no link to New Advent - monetary or otherwise. The "Get it here for only $29.95" does seem like an objection to the Encyclopedia per se.JASpencer 23:37, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I made no allegation about gain, monetary or otherwise. Just pointing out that the characteristics (multiple links, same target, target selling something, links sometimes not adding anything to original article) are similar to those listed in Wikipedia:Spam#How_not_to_be_a_spammer, even if the intention wasn't there. I also doubts of the validity of an encyclopedia citing another encyclopedia MartinRe 23:47, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

The multiple links are a by-product of helping in the Wikipedia Catholic Encylcopedia project, no more, no less. JASpencer 23:52, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Ah, that makes more sense to me now. Thanks. MartinRe 23:58, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I've just looked on the Project page for guidance, and it says It may also help to add an External link to the original article, especially if it was heavily revised in the process of wikification. I suggest if you have any problems on CE external links, that you take it up on its discussion page. You may think that I'm being a bit liberal on this, but as far as I see I'm following the guidance. JASpencer 00:06, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

(unindented for readibility) From reading the project summary myself, I'd agree with having an external reference to the original article where the CE is the primary creation point and/or reference. However, I don't think inserting CE links into existing, well fleshed out, articles is a good idea. For example, God has multiple insertions in the same article which don't flow at all with the rest of the text (which is what triggered my initial concern). Put another way, the EB 1911 is also used in the same way as the CE here, but I wouldn't expect someone to add a link to the EB in an existing article just because the EB also covered it. I would only expect a reference to be added if someone researched the EB and added content based on it, but I wouldn't expect a stand alone reference, which is simply a "see also" link. In summary, I think adding references is good, but adding multiple "see also" links isn't. See what I mean? MartinRe 00:44, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Please could you raise the point on the talk page of the project so that we can get some sort of concensus among the users. I do have an answer in that particular point, but I don't want to encourage a closed discussion of this point. JASpencer 18:19, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Have done so, hope my point is a little clearer on that page. MartinRe 19:06, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Holy House of Loreto

I notice you began the article. Thanks. It has been on my list for quite some time.--Rockero 00:17, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

No problem. Thanks. JASpencer 12:34, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

Freemason NPOV stuff

Can I just say how awesome you are :p Thanks so much for joining the fight over there, your alot better at stuff like this then me :)

Seraphim, this isn't a fight. This is a group of editors who feel very protective towards an institution that takes up a large part of their free time. It is natural for them to want to protect it. Please don't treat it as a "fight" but a patient debate at which both sides try to get to the truth. JASpencer 23:59, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I meant it in a figurative way :) Like "fighting the good fight". Seraphim 01:33, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Oh. If that's the case then thanks. JASpencer 09:13, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

You've got a citation error in Kadosh...

For Kadosh, what you are citing as "Pike's words" are actually his explanation of the claim made against the degree, and he goes on to refute the claim. He's saying "it became known" in reference to the Cerneauist Scotch Rite book, in the sense of "people were told that", not "it is a fact that". Also, the only thing that bothers me re: "The Builder" is that the title "Right Illustrious" (R.I.) doesn't exist in mainstream AASR, so it might also be indicative of a Cerneauist reference. However, for want of any way to verify or disprove it ATM, it can stay.

TBH, Morals and Dogma is not the best source to use for anything; what's Pike's and what's not his is sometimes very hard to differentiate, but in this case he says almost right after your quote: "It will be easy, as we read, to separate the false from the true, the audacious conjectures from the simple facts." So at the very least, I'd ask you to reread the entire section and then see if the material applies to the point being expressed. MSJapan 02:35, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

We'll deal with this in Talk:Catholicism and Freemasonry. However with freemasonic ritual it's amazingly slippery (secrecy, changes, local differences) so one has to rely on secondary sources - preferably Masonic - and Pike is a Masonic source.JASpencer 13:18, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

FM Old Charges

Noted that you asked for a citation related to Atheism the other day.

http://www.grandlodge-england.org/pdf/cr-update1-140905.pdf is the current Book of Constitutions for UGLE.

From page 147 is a copy of the Old Charges which make clear a number of the membership issues.ALR 09:16, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Fine. It's just the way that the Lodges do or don't deal with the various Grand Orients who most definately do let in atheists. JASpencer 17:42, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

In the main I don't think there are any dealings with any self styled Masonry which does not require a belief in a Supreme Being. At least not anything I've ever heard of under UGLE. The regularity issue related to initiating women seems to get treated very differently.ALR 19:09, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Please check your WP:NA entry

Greetings, editor! Your name appears on Wikipedia:List of non-admins with high edit counts. If you have not done so lately, please take a look at that page and check your listing to be sure that following the particulars are correct:

1. If you are an admin, please remove your name from the list.
2. If you are currently interested in being considered for adminship, please be sure your name is in bold; if you are opposed to being considered for adminship, please cross out your name (but do not delete it, as it will automatically be re-added in the next page update).
3. Please check to see if you are in the right category for classification by number of edits.

Thank you, and have a wiki wiki day! BD2412 T 03:56, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Christianity and Freemasonry edits

You've removed some stuff which was either already cited or readily citable. I realize there was a deadline set, but there have been a number of issues on other articles thatr have bneeded to be dealt with as well. I've responded to the site requests, so can you please rollback the edit and add the citations? Some of the info qualifies as common knowledge, too, IMHO, as it appears on almost every GL page (such as not accepting atheists). MSJapan 22:29, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Rolled back as requested. We'll continue this on the article's talk page. JASpencer 23:11, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Roman Catholic Diocese of Macau

It is a Roman Catholic church diocese stub, but I couldn't find the template. Please add it. -Ambuj Saxena (talk) 15:29, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

What about Category:Catholic_diocese_stubs?-Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Probably needs deleting. JASpencer 19:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Usability

Oppose it doesn't seem to work on my explorer. JASpencer 21:20, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Could you please be more specific? What doesn't work? Can you post a screen capture? —David Levy 22:43, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Complaints

You recently wrote an article at Complaints which I believe you meant to post somewhere else. The content of the article was:

Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts

• Imacomp (talk · contribs) is inserting a {{totallydisputed}} tag while refusing to give any specific reasons, saying that it's his editorial prerogative to do so. I believe that he is more interested in the tag remaining than in dealing with any specific problems in the article. ~~~~~

The article has been deleted as non-encyclopedic. Please let me know if you require assistance in the situation you've described therein. JDoorjam Talk 15:33, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

You're right, I do apologise. I was putting this in readiness in case the situation got out of hand. Thank you for your offer of help, I may need to call on it. JASpencer 15:38, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

You might wish to be aware that I've asked for a second Check user on Imacomp and intend asking for the ban on SnF being enforced when it comes up.ALR 18:04, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for doing that. Considering the harm Imacomp's doing to his purported cause you may want to check him against Lightbringer, just in case. JASpencer 18:32, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure it's not LB, the behaviour is SnF all over. Even down to exactly the same edits.ALR 18:51, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I was joking. Sort of. But could SnF himself not be a sockpuppet of lightbringer? After all what does LB want, and what is SnF doing? JASpencer 18:58, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Same MO, different motivations. LB wants unverifiable (and sometimes incorrect) Anti-Masonic information added to the article. He also has a bad habit of accusing everyone of being a Mason and therefore involved in a Satanic conspiracy. I also don't believe LB is RC at all - I know a lot of them, and none are quite that violently anti-Masonic. SnF, OTOH, comes from a Masonic background where there is still public persecution involved, and from his POV, for no real reason. So he would prefer that such unverified material is kept out. I'm sure he has gotten frustrated, because no matter what happens, the socks come back and make a mess. When passive resistance becomes active resistance is entirely up to the individual, and I think everybody has their own limits, after which point they decide they've had it and take things to the next level. So SnF has instead turned to a hardline interpretation of the old (I think) UGLE Masonic charges, basically to prevent nonsense by covering it with more nonsense. I understand and agree with his motivation, as much of the assault on the article falls apart under any sort of scrutiny in accordance with policies, but I don't really agree with his methodology. Like LB, there might be one valid point in there, but getting to it amongst everything else is not that easy.

For example, if Imacomp had simply said there was an issue and worked through it, it would be solved - if there's unverified material, it should be removed or cited. However, that becomes difficult when there's tags on everything Same with LB and the Anti article - of course the summary in FM is no good; it's completely out of date with the content of the current article, and that is because dealing with vandals always takes priority over rewrites. Repeatedly rving external links and adding "critics disagree" (a tautology if ever I saw one) everywhere is also not the way to solve the problem.

However, I believe Imacomp can be reasoned with; LB cannot, as has been shown time and time again. With LB, it comes down to Masonry = an anti-Christian Satanic world conspiracy etc., that he is out to destroy and discredit, and as long as he is going to pick and choose his citations and interpretations and ignore facts in pursuit of that goal, a compromise will never be reached. MSJapan 19:56, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

LB may or may not be an RC, but one of his presumed socks took off [[Category:Roman Catholic]] from my user page. If he wasn't RC he would not have bothered.

Imacomp at the moment can't be reasoned with. Maybe in the long run he'll calm down, but so could LB. They're both redeemable, but neither have been redeemed yet. I think it would be fair to say that there is not a single instance where Imacomp has come to a compromise or entered in any meaningful dialogue with an anti-Masonic link. JASpencer 20:09, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't see any difference between and/or among Snf, MSJapan, Arden, Blueboar, WeganWarrior other than hypocrisy. Snf is open about what he is, the others try and falsely present some moticum of reasonableness, which they are not. Basically they are prepared to let you pitter patter around on the anti-masonry page because they are of the mind that there is no traffic on that page, ergo your 'sublime' efforts are unseen. If on the other hand you were to apply your ample wit to the main field of engagement, the Freemasonry page, were there are actual real people reading it to form their opinion of Freemasonry, you will find there tolerance of you, JASpencer, will vanish and you will be on the receiving end of exactly the same treatment and accusations that others who have gone before you have. All critics of Masonry are 'Antis' in the eyes of Masonry and all, in the end, receive the same Masonic 'Justice'. Time to grow up and face the music on the Freemasonry page brother...40 Days of Lent 09:18, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

40 days, if you are Basil Rathbone your tune has changed. Never mind. We have no alternative but to be sweetly reasonable with them. The wikipedia project is not designed to push any point of view, and it's not our duty to push this.

I am sad about a couple of the Masonic editor's reversion under Imacomp's influence, but Imacomp will soon burn himself out and the masonic editors' desire to show the best side of their institution will soon over-ride their desire to be indulgent to their (12 year old) brother. They must realise how Imacomp appears, and they can't be too happy about it - in fact I know a couple aren't. Personally I want to create some good articles, but if your agenda is to make Freemasonry appear intolerant, secretive and untruthful - why not let him run? JASpencer 22:53, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand why you think Imacomp is an influence on Masonic Editors such as MSJapan - he isn't. There is nothing unique or special about the range of actions taken by Masons in support of each other and taken towards their common goal. The actions of Masons on the internet is the same whether here, or on lists, bulletin boards, websites, or even in the field of publishing written material. They do not want or accept criticism. They will not accept criticism. Freemasonry is a cult. Do you understand? Why will you not accept the word of others who have gone down this path with Masons before? You have the skillset to engage them effectively on Wikipedia, don't get caught up in personalities because with Freemasonry there is none - there is just Freemasonry, and Freemasonry is today what it has always been.

A daemonibus docetur, de daemonibus docet, et ad daemones ducit. It is taught by the demons, it teaches about the demons, and it leads to the demons. - St. Albertus Magnus40 Days of Lent 07:57, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Of course there are personalities in Freemasonry. It must be said that Freemasonry does seem to supress the best in some people's personalities, but don't dehumanise these people, that's where holocausts start. JASpencer 18:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

No Personal Abuse

See Abuse page.

ALR

You should look at the jahbulon talk page sometime. Seraphim 23:46, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok. Imacomp 23:50, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

re Pike and sympathy

You posted the following on my talk page... You said that you were removing until discussion:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Catholicism_and_Freemasonry#Pike_and_sympathy

If your not entering into the discussion then surely you are happy with it?

JASpencer 23:27, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Um... I have been entering into discussion... LOTS OF IT. See that section of the talk page and several others below it. My problems with quoting Pike are all over the talk page. I am not sure I know what you are complaining about. Blueboar 02:20, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Blueboar, you deleted it saying "let's discuss it" and never answered my questions. I'm glad you are now answering as it looked like Blanking. JASpencer 22:58, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I 2nd that Blueboar. Imacomp 02:29, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

JASpencer report on WP:RFI

As you asked for an update, I've archived it. As you've already noticed the checkuser request found you clear (though that was pretty obvious anyway, and I archived before seeing it). Happy NPOV'ing! Petros471 20:13, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. JASpencer 20:40, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

New Catholic Encyclopedia

Did not realize that there were 2 editions... so I do have to admit that it IS possible that there was an article on Freemasonry in the 1967 edition that was cut from the 2002 edition. And you are correct that if this is the case, it is interesting... perhaps it mirrors a shift in the Church's attitude towards the craft that should be mentioned in the Catholicism and Freemasonry article? In any case... I will attempt to find a copy of the 67 edition and cite check that. I will let you know the results no matter what the outcome. I still think that we should cite the original and not the copy. On that I have not changed my mind. Blueboar 02:50, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Quotes in Citations and footnotes

FYI - I have asked all the editors to the various Freemasonry related articles to comment on this issue. I think we need to reach a concensus on when and were a citation needs to have a quotation added. Please note that I can see situations where a quotation might be useful, and do not object to having one in those situations. I just don't think one is needed as often as you do. If we reach an editors consensus, we can do away with future debates on this issue. Blueboar 15:28, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

JAS... do you mind if I cut the accusations of sock puppetry between you and Imacomp (and the cryptic Hugo stuff) that I moved into the "other stuff" area on the Catholicism and Freemasonry page? I am trying to hold a serious consensus poll there and both the accusations and the Hugo stuff just confuse the issue. I don't want to remove anything from a talk page unless the people who wrote it agree. I am going to post the same question to Imacomp. Blueboar 21:47, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

By all means, it makes sense. By the way can I again apologise for getting hot under the collar. Although I think that your proposed idea is going totally against Wikipedia standards for verifiability and would be several steps backwards, I do think that you are well intentioned and that the sinister idea that "masons hate citations" doesn't apply to you. JASpencer 16:00, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

That's very left-handed of you. :) I have to say, in all fairness, that it's not a question of not liking citations, but it's more that there seem to be double standards applied at times (Virchow, for example). Frankly, reliance on one source, especially when it is not an established source, is a bad idea, and I think you're getting the idea that if a Mason objects, it's based on a desire for showing Masonry in a good light, when it's really the similar idea that if something is to be said, it needs to be factual and correct. To put it in a similar context, I've heard it said that Catholics worship idols or that they worship the Virgin Mary and not Jesus. These are certainly claims that are made, but I don't think you'd let them stand as is because they are simply inaccurate, and can be easily proven as such with some basic looking around. The situation is really no different here. Put yourself in other people's shoes: think about what you would think if these were instead articles on anti-clericalism that were trotting out every negative comment or allegation ever made about the Church and every negative event the Church was supposedly "connected with" because the orchestrator was a Catholic. You might get a different perspective on things. MSJapan 04:51, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Firstly thank you for coming on to my Talk Page. I do appreciate it, and my somewhat sharp comments that at times will follow should be read in the light of a genuine appreciation that you are big enough to start a dialogue that to my shame I wasn't.

I know that you don't dislike citations per se, but there does seem to be an attitude among a couple of editors that citations and quotations are somewhat troublesome (grotesque was a word that was used recently). I know that you don't see that but as long as people such as you and Blueboar condone that behaviour from Masonic editors you are approving that attitude.

As far as double standards goes, I agree. Virchow's Freemasonry was verifiable twice over and was fought tooth and nail on the Virchow page, while asking for quotations from obscure texts that support Masonic views has been seen as unnecesary. At times citation requests have been removed with the instruction "follow the link". Other citations have been removed or pruned of their quotations. But I don't think that these are the double standards you mean. Virchow's Masonry was verifiable, although whether it met with WP:NOR is another, far murkier, question (far murkier does not always mean that on reflection I may have been wrong - but on this occassion it does).

As to "I think you're getting the idea that if a Mason objects, it's based on a desire for showing Masonry in a good light" am I always wrong? I do believe that some of the Masonic editors are better than others, but the weakness is that when one has spoken the others feel obliged (in both senses) to follow. This can have some comic effects, such as when Imacomp deleted the Protestant origins - which was an attempt to add in some of the sounder moderate Masonic history - that the Vatican and the Catholic powers got worried about a secret society that originated and was controlled from London - the most powerful Protestant city - rather than for any inherent heresy. I'm not going to go to the stake to defend that theory - although it has merit - especially when Freemasons object to it.

On the other hand there have been sources being blanked have been justified after one of the more hot headed Masonic editors decided that almost every edit of mine was to be reversed on principle. With the exception of ALR none of you seem to have the guts to slap down Imacomp. He could be a reasonably competent editor if he showed a bit of humility and respect, so you're not doing him any service by playing to his childishness. I don't mind that much, it's just a bit more work, but he makes your club look closed and intollerant.

On being factual and correct I do agree with you, but the standard by which these virtues are judged here are "Verifiability not truth", see WP:V. Truth, especially on religious matters, while being objective (I'm a Catholic after all) is something that honest men can find it easy to differ. Verifiability on the other hand is an easier standard to agree. Thus with Virchow, it is verifiable that American Masonic historians recognised him as a German Freemason. They may be mistaken, or their detractors may not have access to some irregular Lodge's records, but the fact about Virchow being recognised as a Freemason is a click away (well, two clicks). It may need careful wording but to oppose it's inclusion because you haven't heard the fact before is going to arouse suspicion. Always imagine "what would I think of that argument if JASpencer put it forward?"

As to Catholics worshiping idols - if you have a prominent Catholic claiming that they do this then cite it and quote it. If you have a critic claiming that we do this then cite and quote that, with the proviso that you make clear it is a critic. I have let claims stand about the Knights of Columbus for example that were blatantly false, although the wording did have to change. In the end I'm confident that the Catholic critique of Freemasonry is sound (if at times overheated) and so can stand a thousand fact checks. I don't think that I can be accused of being shy of citations and quotations - I even defended Imacomp on this point (and got the sharp end of Lightbringer's tongue for asking for a higher standard than he thought - rightly - citations inserted by Masonic had).

And so we move on to being in another's shoes. Yes, I understand that Freemasonry is dear to you and is central to your outlook. And it's natural that you don't like criticism of it. However if you edit a page dealing with Catholic attitudes to Freemasonry then you are going to get some very unflattering views, and sometimes with ample provocation from Freemasonry itself. These views are on the record, they're not inserted after the event by some editor with a grudge and the initials LB. A lot of nasty things are said about my Church, and it is a large human institution with a long history and ideals of perfection - there are a lot of justifiable criticisms. I don't love the Church any less (despite an occassional wish to throttle a couple of Her bishops). And that is my view of my Church - blemished, run by sinners, but the barque of Christ and the door of Salvation. I suppose this fleshiness is a Catholic thing. I know it doesn't give you the lightbulb moment you were hoping for, but I do expect Masonic editors to take their lumps as much as I expect Catholic editors to.

I want to thank you again for your comments. God bless you. JASpencer 20:55, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

JAS... I am glad to read the comments you made to MSJ above. They reaffirm my belief that you are approaching your editing from a fair (if admittedly POV) viewpoint. The two of us may get into heated debate over what should be included (or, as now, HOW they should be included)... but we can at least argue in good faith, knowing that neither of us is really pushing an unreasonable objective. And with this in mind...

I posted the following onto the talk pages of most of the regular editors to the various Freemasonry related articles (and yes, I have included the NON-Freemasons such as Seraphim and DonnaNobisPacem. If you feel that there is anyone I left out, please notify them. Without comment by others on the quotation issue, I doubt either of us will "back down" on our concept of how to do things... And I really don't want the two of us to get into a revert war. This is what I posted:

• ..."As you may know, JASpencer and I are having a minor argument over how to present quotations that support statements made in the various Freemasonry related articles. JAS preffers to include them in the citations, as footnotes, while I feel they should be included in the main text. Would you be so kind as to check out my sample section at Catholicism and Freemasonry/example and compare it to the same section at the Catholicism and Freemasonry article. I would be interested in your oppinion (as well as those of all the editors of these articles) as to which style you prefer. Feel free to pass this on to any one you feel would give an honest oppinion. (sent to all regular editors of the Freemasonry related pages) Blueboar 18:10, 16 April 2006 (UTC)"

Oh... I hope you had a pleasant Easter. "The Lord has Risen!" ... god bless. Blueboar 19:26, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Unclear request on RFC Policy

On Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Policies, you posted "Talk:Catholicism and Freemasonry - Removing quotation requests if inconvenient. 20:05, 8 April 2006 (UTC)". This makes no sense to me- even after reading a bit of the talk page I'm not sure whether you were referring to Talk:Catholicism and Freemasonry#The need for quotations in footnotes and citations? or not. Could you clarify your request? --maru (talk) contribs 03:49, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid the Talk Page has grown a bit since I put in the RFC. I suppose the section "The need for quotations in footnotes and citations?" is as good a place as any to put in an outside view, and I appreciate the fact that you have done so. Please be careful when you tread into these pages. JASpencer 17:47, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

Vatican Documents and Copyrights

Do you know if a Vatican Declariation can be freely published anywhere? Can we freely publish Declariations made by the Holy See on Wikipedia? If so, is there a statement about copyrights from the Vatican we can use. Any help is appreciated. Thanks. [[[User:Simonapro|Simonapro]] 14:33, 3 May 2006 (UTC)]

Can you help at the Opus Dei RfC?

There is a request for comments at the Opus Dei Talk Page. I fear some anti-Opus Dei guys want to turn things upside down in the name neutrality. The previous editors continue to argue in terms of Wikipedia:NPOV, but the new guys seem to have their own ideas on how Wikipedia should be written. They are anti-authority; they resent the dictatorship of Jimbo Wales. Can you help and give some comments? Thanks! Walter Ching 05:55, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Walter, thank you for the invitation. I will look over the RfC, but can't promise that I will be able to comment on it as I've taken little interest in the article. JASpencer 20:08, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Reminder

This is a reminder to go vote by June 7 for the Catholic Collaboration of the Week. Support or comment on the current nominations, or nominate an article for collaboration.

Vote in progress to move Counter-Reformation to Catholic Reformation

This move makes sense because Counter-Reformation implies that that the movement was against reform. Rather as a reform movement within the Catholic Church, it is most precisely known as the Catholic Reformation. This is now the more favored term in academic theological circles.

Please stop by talk:Counter-Reformation for the vote. Thanks, --Vaquero100 19:30, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Long talk page

Greetings! Your talk page is getting a bit long in the tooth - please consider archiving your talk page (or ask me and I'll archive it for you). Cheers! BD2412 T 23:58, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Reminder

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Wikiproject Catholicism Assessment

Hello, fellow WikiProject Catholicism member. The project has recently begun work on assessing articles relating to Catholicism, and you are invited to comment and participate. The subpage for this assessment is located here. Thank you. —Mira 07:27, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Charles-François Baillargeon

I removed the redirect you had on Charles-François Baillargeon and replaced it with a stub article. If that is not the correct procedure, please let me know. Thanks! Stormbay 18:38, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

"Relegating"

JASpencer, thank you for your note on my talk page. I apologize if I have given offense. My understanding of the Traditionalist Catholic article is that it discusses the desire of some Catholics to return to the pre-Conciliar liturgical practices. While I agree with you that the central narrative of the Catholic Church in our times is the decline in adherants in the first world (and the conversion of Latin Americans in large number to Evangelical churches) in large part stemming from the degradation of the traditional Church, it would be a real stretch to say that most Catholics are pining for the Tridentine mass. In most cities there is just one or several Churches offering the Tridentine liturgy and they are not bursting at the seems. While Catholic 45 and younger have a strong attraction to the tradition of the Church and aspects of the earlier traditional forms, most are not demanding a complete reversal of the reforms. So, while a significant number of Catholics, myself included, identify themselves as traditional (which I understand to mean obedient to the magisterium and the liturgical laws) those who are Traditionalist (which I understand to mean practicing the Tridentine liturgy) are significantly fewer and fairly distant from "the central narrative" of the Church today. I would be glad to talk about this more, if you like. Vaquero100 20:12, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks again for your note on my talk page, JASpencer. I agree with everything that you said. Clearly the after-effects of the Council are a major concern for the Church, as it is a major concern for me, personally. However, as much as Traditionalists consider themselves as the embodiment of these concerns and even the embodiment of the solution, this is precisely what makes them very fringe in the Church and out of line with the Magisterium. The problems of the Church in the modern world are far to complex and vast to be solved by the 1962 or any other missal. Historians of the Church in the twentieth century agree that a crisis was brewing in Post WWII intellectual, political and cultural circles as early as the late 1940's and even the 1930's. The crisis was coming whether the Council was held or not. The Council did its best to stem the coming crisis before it was too late.

Evidence for the coming crisis includes the fact that new vocations to religious life among women were already beginning to decline as early as 1960. This decline began precisely as the demographics of the baby boom generation would suggest an explosion of new vocations cannot be explained by the "effects of Vatican II." In fact, the unprecedented social changes brought about by the War years including women pursuing higher education and joining the work force in mass numbers were destined to bring about much of what eventually did happen in the 1960's. College level co-education was a movement set into motion in the late 40's on campuses private and public all across the nation. The Ivies got all the attention in the late 60's and early 70's because they were among the last hold outs, but the movement was well in motion BEFORE the Council. The sexual revolution was coming. The feminist crisis was coming too. Even in "I Love Lucy" in the placid 1950's nearly every episode dealt with the frustration of housewives whose functional (though not moral and spiritual) indespensibility was being replaced by modern conveniences from washing machines to TV dinners. The constant chipping away at gender roles began in film in the 1930's and 1940's with an impressive array of films by the likes of Katherine Hepburn and other leading women who played competant lawyers and other dominant roles.

Other shifts were happening at the cultural and philosophical levels. The cumulative felt need to abandon the cruel past and begin afresh as well as the practical need to reconstruct Europe combined in an era of new construction materials and techniques and a shift in international design tastes, already expressed in the pre-War design concepts of Bahaus and le Corbusier. The resulting modern or "international style" made the Nineteenth century devotional images and architecture look tacky and irrelevant by the tastes of the time. In fact, the whole of the Church's artistic and architectual patrimony came to look stuffy and tired, a lot like renovating half your house and leaving the other half worn and 30 years out of date. In the 1950's Catholics and other Christians were living in a world that made their Sunday worship from the vestments to the hymnody to the Latin to the architecture look more and more like an curious and odd relic of history rather a living tradition.

In philosophy the incredible damage done by Derrida only began in 1967, but he was building upon and was simply the logical consequence of the Existentialists of the 40's and 50's, who were indebted to Heideggar in the 1930's, who "built upon Neitzche in the 1880's who ultimately was a consequence of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason published a year earlier in 1781. The foundations of Western Civilization and Catholic culture had been crumbling for centuries by the time of the Second Vatican Council. Furthermore, the Church's strategy of protecting Catholics from such intellectual onslaughts by the enforcement of the index was beginning to fail as affordable public universities in America and Europe were expanded to reach the majority of the middles classes.

Concurrently, as the emerging power of secularism was beginning to be unleashed (1960 JFK promises to NOT let his faith shape his presidential decisions) the Church saw in its historic enemies (Protestants, the Orthodox, and adherents of other religions) potential allies in facing the coming onslaught. This proved to be true when after standing alone in the fight against abortion since 1973, Evangelicals and the Republican Party in the US began to join the effort in the early 80's.

While the 1950's are commonly remembered as placid in today's popular culture, just beneath the surface were explosive currents which the Catholic intellectual community correctly understood as profoundly threatening. Finding a way to communicate with fidelity the ancient teachings in an idiom accessible to modernity was crucial if it was to weather the storm. The Council was not about making changes for the sake of change (although many developments "on the ground" following the Council were for the sake of mere novelty), rather the Council documents were primarily an apologia written to the modern world to explain the Church's ongoing role at the center of humanity. Many of the liturgical changes were made precisely to make the message of the Gospel even more accessible to the modern person than the ideas of the deconstructionists and the like.

Personally, I am a traditional Catholic. I do deeply desire a more profound recovery of the riches of the great ancient Tradition. But I am a traditional Catholic not because I think the SVC was a complete failure. Given the depths of the 60's cultural crisis, a 1950's style Catholicism might have collapsed completely. The reforms probably saved the Church through without comp I am a traditional Catholic because I believe the Holy Spirit is moving the Church at this time to cherish the Tradition and bring it to a new generation which is hungry for eternal truth expressed as alien to the modern world. The dissatisfaction with the modern world is now the Church's ally just as the attraction of the modern world 40 years ago was the Church's enemy.

I am not so naive to think that reverting (to us a wikiword) to the Catholicism of the 1950's is the answer because I dont think SVC was the problem. The problem was a cultural crisis on the scale of the French Revolution, the Reformation or the fall of Rome. I believe the Council was a prophetic movement of the Holy Spirit that probably saved the Catholic Church from a complete annihilation. A 1950's style Church would have been utterly unable to communicate with the 1960's generation at all. In fact, at least at the time, the parts of the Church which were least adaptable in that period have actually been worse than decimated. The entrenched and rigid French Canadian Church which had been the strongest element of the Church in North America was leveled to such a degree that scant evidence of a future even today. Conversely, the nation with the most practicing faithful in the world, the United States, was precisely the nation in which the reforms took their firmest roots.

As the Holy Spirit moved the Church in the middle of the last century to prepare for a coming urgent crisis, so I believe the Holy Spirit is moving the Church presently to weather the longer effects of secularism by returning to many or even most of its ancient expressions to offer as a refreshment to contemporary weariness with modern emptiness.

As a traditional Catholic I can praise God for his work in the Church in the age of the Council, and for his work in the present age and his work in all ages, because the expression of the faith is not the faith. He will always lead us to expressions of the faith necessary for the moment just as he always has. There is no magic in a fiddleback chasuble vs. any other kind of chasuble (in fact there have been myriad styles of such vestments, new styles in every age) except that the Holy Spirit will lead us to the proper expression for out age. He will lead us, as only He knows how, to find the way to communicate to soft spots in the hardened hearts in every generation.

So, yes, I love and welcome the Tradition of the Church, but no I am not a traditionalist. Rather, a traditional Catholic who sees the Spirit at work in every age. This does not make me a relativist either. The content of the faith and morals of the Church are immutable. I will fight for them just like I will fight for the Church's immutable nature and its immutalbe name (as I have become known for on WP).

The traditionalist on the other hand confuses the immutable Tradition with its very mutable expression over time. What is essential about Latin when the Church has from the beginning prayed in Greek, Slovonic, Aramaic as well as other languages?

So, the traditional Catholic and the Traditionalist are similar on the surface (at the moment) but are profoundly different in their theological understanding of the ongoing revelation or development in the Church. The traditionalist sees the Church as static and fundamentally uncreative. The traditional Catholic sees the human capacity for ingenuity as a potential means for good or evil. It's use for evil on the part of some demands its use for the good on the part of others. This is the ongoing playing out of good and evil in history. I believe the SVC was a profoundly creative response motivated by the Spirit to counteract a massive impending evil dynamic in history. Now at another juncture in history, the Spirit is preparing the Church to creatively counteract new and present evils. So lets not confuse the two.

My apologies for the incredibly long message. I appreciate this conversation because it is helping me to synthesize and formulate how I presently understand this topic. Vaquero100 01:58, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Freemasonry

You've done a lot of research into Freemasonry over the past few months: leaving the Church's opinion out of it for the moment, what's your opinion? Just curious.--SarekOfVulcan 21:01, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean, but will try to answer as best I can. I think that Freemasonry is religiously indifferent and so hostile to any form of religious dogma, and so unwise for anyone who values their religion (and not simply some belief in God and good living). I believe it was a source of much (not all) of the de-Christianisation of Catholic societies such as Italy, Mexico and France - much of it before the breach with UGLE. The influence of Freemasony admittedly seems to be dying out in Continental Europe today as ex-Marxists seem to be taking the lead in the secularist crusade. I hope that answers your question. JASpencer 21:16, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Yup, it answers it. I disagree with the "indifference" being hostile to religion, but I respect that you've come to that conclusion.--SarekOfVulcan 21:33, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Liebermann, Bruno Franz Leopold

This has been deleted as an empty article.  (aeropagitica)  (talk)  23:47, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Jean-Baptiste de La Brosse

I started a new article on Jean-Baptiste de La Brosse the other day. He happened to be an early Canadian missionary who had an impact for his time. Would one insert this name at Wikipedia:Catholic Encyclopedia cat Missionaries or is that a list defined by certain parameters within the project underway? As you would see from my edit history, I do quite a lot of stuff from the Dictionary of Canadian Biography — DoCB Initiative. Obviously, there are articles that have priest/missionary/bishop/archbishop subjects. I try to link anything I start as thoroughly as I can. However, I don't presume to "jump into" someone's project without understanding how they operate. I have posted some other things on the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Catholicism site but I'm not sure that people are reading and actioning stuff as happens on an individual talk page. Thanks for your time! Stormbay 21:16, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the offer; maybe later. I am more interested in finding out whether the Wikipedia:WikiProject Catholicism is interested in being alerted to articles that appear to me to have interest to them. Cheers! (also, who best to alert.) Stormbay 22:23, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Catholic Collaboration

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--Briancua 12:42, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

all appologies

JAS - thanks for the kind appology on my talk page. I really was not offended as much as frustrated. We all come at the same material from different POVs, and sometimes it is hard to understand why another editor does not see things that I think are obvious. I not only accept you appology (although it was not needed), I return a similar appology if I have said anything that offended you.Blueboar 11:14, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Blanchard

The quotes re: the tiara, etc., are in the discussion that is now at the top of the Talk:Catholicism and Freemasonry page. I think all the info is there, though the ISBN may be needed, which is readily accessible via Amazon. MSJapan 12:38, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Silence does not mean anything except "I am away"

JAS, Just so you know, I will be off for about a week (I have to go to out of state to bury my father, who passed away last Sept. This was the first chance the entire family could gather to take care of that little detail)... I don't want you to think that since I am not replying to whatever comments or changes you post I am giving tacit agreement. I'll see what kind of mischief you have gotten into when I get back and will rant and rave about how awful they are at that time. Have fun storming the castle! Blueboar 21:49, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Biblical scholar articles

Please stop making them as you are currently doing. Each and every one of the subjects must have a "claim to fame" stated, or they do not belong on Wikipedia. (|-- UlTiMuS ^{( U • T • C | M • E )} 13:10, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

HI mate look if you don't want your articles deleted you need to add a little for info to make it notable otherwise you are wasting your time. good luckJames Janderson 13:27, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

hi cool man, you don't even have to write a great long article just add his birth dates, nationality, and why what he did was notable but try to avoid direct copywright. that should stop other users from deleting them. ok mate James Janderson 13:32, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

hi just a little bit more needed see Giovanni Antoniano. Nationality and dates of life are very important.James Janderson 14:10, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

see Aymeric of Piacenza

Profession

Might I ask what your profession is? I'm increasingly impressed by your approach to data representation, and I'm curious as to whether you deal in the discipline. Thanks ALR 15:33, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

An intruigingly opaque response, I won't probe any further. Thankyou for taking the time anyway.ALR 17:52, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

OK. The question itself was pretty clear, as far as I can work out. In any case, putting the statement with respect to data representation in context, which I'm surprised I'm having to do: In WP we are present items of data to the reader to convey information, those data can be communicated and structured in different ways, the end result being subtleties in the message being inferred by the reader. I'm intruiged and impressed by the discipline which you manage to apply to disaggregation and segragation of data in presenting it to the reader.

I'll concede that it's not a style that I'm comfortable with, were I to present something to a client in the style I'd feel as if it lacked something, since I prefer presenting richer content. Despite that I have some admiration for people who can distance themselves from the content in that way.

What brought it to mind is that some work I'm doing at the moment on collaboration strategies.ALR 19:54, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Why lots of sources don't equal validity....

Much in the same way as it seems you are trying to say Jahbulon is bigger than it appears because of the sources available, on a similar note, I notice nothing regarding Catholics worshipping idols appears in the Catholicism articles. Google "Catholics worship idols", and look at all the sources, pro and anti. By your own statements, you would seem to be saying that this is also something that needs to be addressed, because it's obviously a huge issue.

Now, I had personally never heard of this from anyone ever until it came up in a discussion relatively recently. So, as far as I'm concerned, it's not a big issue, nor is it a valid one. Then again, it is all over the Internet. In short, Catholics and idols is precisely the same situation as Masons and Jahbulon, and I have a feeling the outcome is exactly the same: all the claimants who think Catholics worship idols don't really understand what it means to be Catholic, just as the claimants regarding Jahbulon don't know what it means to be a Royal Arch Mason, or a Mason at all. The parallels bear consideration. MSJapan 19:08, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Well the issue needs to be dealt with as the clashes about Iconoclasm reshaped the history of the church in both the east and the West. The use of statues and relics are also a clear dividing line between Catholicism/Orthodoxy and Protestanism, Judaism and Islam. And there are plenty of articles on this. JASpencer 19:19, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

But what's on the Internet isn't about Iconoclasm, and it's not a theological discussion, it's simply repeated allegations and refutations of idol worship among Catholics with no real sourcing. It doesn't hold up to scrutiny, and neither does the Jabulon nonsense.

But what you're talking about is Idolatry in Christianity. Not a great article, but a necesary subject. JASpencer 20:29, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

AFD removal

JAS... I have no objection to your removing the AFD box on the Jahbulon article... I just wonder if it was correct to do so by wiki rules. We have not yet recieved an official response to my withdrawal of the AFD nomination. Just wanted to point that out. As far as I am concerned deleting it is fine. Blueboar 20:02, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

No need to put it back... we can do so if we are yelled at.  :>) Blueboar 20:15, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

DYK

On 27 August, 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Coetus Internationalis Patrum, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

Catholicism and Freemasonry updated

I added in all the stuff I could from the "article-ready" section of the to-do list, but I didn't know where to put the last two. Can you check everything over and make sure it's where it should be? MSJapan 20:55, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Simon

You might also want to be aware that this is not the first issue with him, but you might not remember the others. He has often engaged in circular arguments that have gone nowhere, and has refused to take citations as legitimate (at which point said items violate NOR, in his view). Before you go any further with this, I suggest you view his contribution history. MSJapan 23:45, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Just a few things about me that MSJapan has misrepresented. My name is not Simon. My username is Simonapro. Second of all I created the article Quaesitum est (among other things I do here). My arguements are straight and to the point about the use of WP:CITE style to prevent WP:NOR violations. I often ask for cites using the { { fact } } tags. (Simonapro 15:39, 30 August 2006 (UTC))

Hi. I like your enthusiasm for creating new articles but Why create the articles if you don't categorize them e.g Category:French writers etc.? They are of very little use to anybody if you don't do this. I am sure I have told you this before. Surely you want your articles to be useful to people. I mean they are limited enough as they are and don't really state why they are notable - no places of birth no dates ? Please begin to add a little more info to put it into its context and PLEASE categorize rather than stating just Catholic Encyclopedia. Your work could become useful if you could just to this. At least then a reader can connect it to French writers or some other category rather than just being a Catholic sub stubErnst Stavro Blofeld 18:45, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

HI mate. Sorry if I sounded a little harsh before but from what I have seen from your latest articles they are much improved. Your article stubs now link to others and the reader can grab a historical, religious and indeed national concept of what it is about. Well done try to keep it up! Ernst Stavro Blofeld 14:50, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Marcel Lefebvre

Dear Mr Spencer,

While some of your edits to this article are great, many many are not. For instance, today you removed several sentences about the reform of the Holy Ghost Fathers seminaries (and referred to this on the Talk page). You state there "It has the ring of truth about it but I can find nothing on the internet on this so I can't cite it." Virtually ALL of the edits which I made to this page several months ago come from THE biography about Lefebvre by Bernard Tissier de Mallerais. You seem to think that a webpage is a better source of material than a book. In this case you are wrong. You have added all sorts of references to particular webpages (many of which are not very good sources), instead of using the major source which is cited at the bottom of the article. Please stop your edits until you get a hold of some books about the subject. Noel S McFerran 21:16, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Move Roman Catholic Church to Catholic Church

There is a vote at Talk:Roman Catholic Church: A Vote on the Title of this Article on moving Roman Catholic Church to Catholic Church. You are invited to review it. --WikiCats 03:53, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I am trying tounderstand your approach at Marcel Lefebvre

I was looking over this page and I want to understand what you thinking here and where it came from. There is so much instruction creep here at WP I am sure you are familar with pages talking of all this that I have never seen. You stated:

If these assertions don't have citations in two days I will start deleting them. If anyone wants me to hold off a particular assertion then please let me know. I'll hold off if it's in an offline book, but only to give some time, not for ever.

If I understand you correctly, you would still remove these statements if someone stated that the information came from a particular book and listed the book ISBN. Is that correct? What are you meaning when you ask for a "citation"? Can you show me what you think is the bare minimum information need in an acceptable citation. Do you believe any of these statements to be unverifiable? Do you believe any of these statements are incorrect or controversial? And last but not least can you point me to where you got all these ideas from. I really must admit I am very confused by the way you are applying WP:V, but I can only imagine it is due to other instruction creep somewhere. It is clear to me you are trying to do what you think is the right thing. It is not clear to me why you believe this to be the right thing. Any help making it more clear would be greatly appreciated. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 04:10, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I am sorry about misrepresenting your actions. I was thinking more about the ultimate position you hold rather than the particular way things unfolded in this case. Regarding my position of a book slapped at the bottom of the article. I think material is such an article should be improved rather than removed. By looking through the history is should be pretty easy to figure out. Which editor added the reference? Looking at that particular edits by that editor, do they contain the sort of detailed information which must have been taken from an actual source? These edits can be converted to footnotes. albeit without page numbers. Edits made by other editors after this reference was added must be treated as unsourced. I would not be supportive of people adding new information without page numbers once the article has already been converted to citation style. I do feel we need to allow something along the lines of "grandfathering" older sourced material. Do you have any questions about my position? I am trying to explain myself clearly, but I don't know of I am succeeding. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 01:41, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I was thinking last night about your misunderstanding of my position. I wonder if you also misunderstand my intentions here. I imagine that I would agree with many of your removals. Some of the things on your list may end up being things I advocate removing. I do think you are a bit overzealous however and I am trying to determine the point at which my opinion diverges from yours. I have never worked at bringing citations into an article but it is the main thing anticipate doing at WP in the future. Because of my inexperience not all of my ideas in regard to this process are very firm. Really I am trying to understand your ideas as well as the ideas of those who oppose you and make my own mind as to where I stand. I am not intending to try and take you down point by point. I really think the work you are doing is great. I have overly focused on the three things we disagree with here rather than making you aware of my support of your work in improving the citation of sources. There is just more to talk about in the areas where we disagree :) --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 10:33, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Some hopeful news

I have found a local copy of the biograpy in english! Unfortunately it is not at a library were I can have check out privledges. Luckily according to their online catalog, it is indexed. So I should be able to do this quickly. I do not know if they have any public access computers there either. So I am printing out a copy of the article and going to do my best to work this out after I get off work. If you have anything else you would like me to verify, or anything currently not in the article you would like me to look up please let me know ASAP. I do not plan on making a second trip. I have never been to this library so hopefully it works out and they let people off the street in, but we will see. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 13:52, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I am glad to be of help, hopefully there are no problems getting access. It is at a local Jesuit University and it appears to be in a general area. Usually you can act like a student and get access to most everything that isn't on a computer. I will let you know what I find out tonight, but I have plans the next two evenings so I may not get to actually update the article till the weekend.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 17:39, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I've got good news and bad news. I was able to get my hands on the book, however it was not in english. Luckily french is my third best language. Unfortunately finding information in my third best language takes much longer to do than in english. I was able to confirm most of the information, strangely the date on #1 is incorrect. I did run short of time and will have to go back next week (with a french-english dictionary) to work on the rest. I will not be able to update the article till at least Thursday evening.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 12:31, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

You're welcome. I should have some more to add this coming week. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 02:08, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Update on Scottish Rite

Hi JAS... I just wanted to update you on the progress of my research into whether the Catholic Encyclopedia was correct in stating that the Knight Kadosh degree contains a part where they "trample" on the papal tiara... unfortunately, the result is "no confirmation" either way.

I have discovered that you were correct in thinking that Inner Sanctuary is the name of Pike's revised ritual, but I have been unable to obtain an actual copy of it to see what it contains. I have also been able to confirm that the current (as of 2004) ritual does not contain tiara trampling etc. Unfortunately, this confimation came to me through a verbal conversation, and thus is not citable. Given my inability to definitively discover the facts ... I now must concede that it is at least possible that the revised Pike ritual contained the elements objected to by the Church.

At the moment, the statements in the Christianity and Freemasonry article are techincally accurate, in that Magnum Opus does not contain trampling... but if you feel the need to re-write the section to reflect my lack of confirmation on subsequent Pike revisions, I will not object. If you are willing to put the info about the 2004 revision in without citation, I can assure you that my source is trustworthy. However, I do understand if you demand a citable source before adding such statements. Blueboar 15:56, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I knew I forgot something! Magnum Opus is the original Pike ritual, which I do have a copy of. Would we be violating OR if we made the following logical path: that if the tiara does not appear in the original (Magnum Opus), and it does not appear in a later revision (2004, assuming it does not differ substantially from the original), that it would be fair to state that the CE is working from the Cerneau Knight Kadosh (where it does appear, and has been stated in numerous sources as appearing there) and not the Pike? MSJapan 18:55, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I'll reply on here.

Blueboar, thank you very much for your research. It is interesting that the Inner Sanctuary is actually ritual. All I was sure was that it was that the CE article quoted from this and not the Magnum Opus. I think that it is 90% safe to say that it doesn't happen any more, at least not in the A&ARSJ (although I bet that there's a Latin Orient or two that does).

MSJ, I don't think that the CE was quoting from a Cernau ritual - partly because it's different from Cerneau version (for example Larry Holly quotes from this) and partly because it specifically cites Pike's Inner Sanctuary. I think all we can say at the moment is that the CE cites Pike (correctly or not - we don't know).

As an unencyclopedic aside, I'll sit down at some time to work out the dates - I think that he wrote the Magnum Opus before he wrote his condemnations of Cerneau and the Inner Sanctuary after.

JASpencer 20:39, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

De-prod

Hi. I see you deproded Brandon Darrow and Jack Mercer. Fair enough but I wish you'd put an original research tag or made the merge rather than just suggest it, when really it shouldn't be controversial. These two articles were created by a user whose sole edits consist of inserting stupid mistakes in biographical articles or creating these fake bios of characters. In any case, I've made both of these redirects and deleted the content. Thanks. Pascal.Tesson 00:29, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Re: Arnav Tripathy

I am returning this article to deletion status. Since there has been a contest to my original note, I will put it under AfD rather than PROD.

Note that the article says he is a prominent High School mathematician. He placed 6 at MathCounts, a national mathematics competition, and a gold medal at another international mathematics competition. Both of these (and it should be noted, unreferenced) claims make him a top math student.

A mathematician is one who adds original research or knowledge to the study of mathematics. This kid just does his calculus problems really fast. While it might mean a lot to him, he has done nothing notable. He is not a mathematician, even if the article claims it. He's just a really bright math student. Such persons are not notable re: WP:BIO. --Jayron32 16:31, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Barbara Atkin

Fair enough. She is one of Canada's top 30 power women. But the article still reads like a vanity article and needs some serious work. But I will no longer contest it. --Jayron32 16:33, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Calvin Williams

I fail to understand what sort of point you were making by deprodding this article. It's not a matter of needing a citation -- I am familiar with the subject area and double-checked with references. It's a matter of this article not having any basis in fact and needing to be removed from the encyclopedia. At this point, that means AfD. Erechtheus 22:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I invite you to review WP:PROD. This was an uncontroversial deletion, as evidenced by the survival of the template until you came by and decided to apply something that I think you got from WP:SPEEDY about A7. Erechtheus 22:10, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nutt

Hi. You're the only established user arguing for a keep on this article, but I suspect it's a hoax. Would you mind double-checking? Thanks, William Pietri 16:24, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Ulla Sandbaek

Dear JASpencer,

As you should be able to see from the edits to this page, I am the so-called phantom poster (who subsequently identified herself, twice) who had to change the page several times to bring it into the reality-based world. 1st of all, the term "population control" was used - this is a perjorative thrown around by specific organizations with a specific political agenda to discredit efforts to bring family planning services to the developing world. Then, of course, it was put back, shampoo, rinse, repeat.

This was rather disturbing given that the article on the Sandbaek report itself has a wikipedia page and anyone could have simply looked there, or followed the links to the source materials, to see what the report was really about - which most emphatically is not "population control."

2nd, I noticed the resources for the information initially in the entry included C-Fam, a front group for the Vatican. They are notorious for putting out information on this topic that is very slanted, if not blatantly false. There is no reason to rely on a heavily political lobby group when the actual report is available.

Third, to highlight abortion rather than the other issues addressed in the report - its findings, the shocking disregard for maternal health in developing countries and development programs alike, the impact of the lack of reproductive health services on family development, community cohesion, and society overall... People familiar with these issues are quite accustomed to the way political groups try to discredit comprehensive reports and programmes on reproductive health by focusing on one controversial aspect. Unfortunately, the effect of the entry the way it was written would be to lead someone to think - "oh, Ulla Sandbaek - she's the one who wrote that report about abortion" or "she's the one who made the EU give money for abortion."

Now, if you think this is just one person's opinion, I challenge you to look at the report and determine what percentage of space - how much attention it gives - to the issue of abortion versus the rest of its content. You will see that it is relatively minimal. A correct "short take" on the report would focus on its main points, not a relatively minor point that was found to be controversial by a handful of actors (it certainly was not controversial to most of the EU governments, almost all of whom support legalised abortion).

Wikipedia is a valuable resource and its pages should not be co-opted (however unwittingly) to fit any group's particular agenda.

If you think there is interest in having a short summary of the report based on its actual contents on that page, I'd be happy to oblige. Or, if the controversy is an important point, specify that it was controversial for just a few actors (the Vatican, Malta, and perhaps a few others, and list the many for whom it was not controversial). Otherwise, just stay out of it by steering people to the wikipedia page on the report itself and let people figure it out for themselves.

I hope this explains the matter clearly.

If you wish to explain the matter clearly you should (1) stop deleting factual information, (2) stop refering to Catholic groups as "front groups for the Vatican and (3) stop waffling so much. JASpencer 21:00, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Proposed Merger of Michael Lee Amesbury and Paul Andrews (British politician)

I have removed your merge tags from these articles. The debate about whether Councillors are noteable has already happened and no consensus was reached (see Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Manchester_councillors). Thanks Thegraham 07:47, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Merging Councillors

Could I ask Mr Spencer to cease and desist from attempting to merge Manchester councillors' entries onto the wards they represent. These people are largely self-important politicians and giving them further publicity on a page which is reserved for information about the area itself is inappropriate and unfair. I will oppose.

--Hardylane 01:33, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree - I am reverting the changes. You should have used the merge tags (like you began with) and then waited for responses to them. Thegraham 09:06, 2 October 2006 (UTC)