A new homosexual website, ChurchOuting.org, is intent on publicly disclosing who the gay priests are in the Archdiocese of Washington. The goal of this outing is to intimidate gay priests, as well as heterosexual priests who may be “romantically involved,” into voicing objections to the Catholic Church’s opposition to gay marriage.

This initiative is the work of Phil Attey, self-described as “Liberal-Gay-Ardent Obama Supporter”; he was active in the Obama Pride Metro-DC campaign. According to one news report, “Attey is going to approach priests he thinks are gay, and warn them that they better stop lobbying against gay people, seeing how gay they are…or…else?”

Catholic priests are also being pressured to sign the “Declaration of Religious Support for Marriage Equality,” a statement by Clergy United for Marriage Equality. The statement, while it is not one we support, is respectfully written. Accordingly, we will write to members of the Steering Committee of this group asking them to dissociate themselves from this attempted hijacking of their effort.

The Catholic League is prepared to assist any priest in the Archdiocese of Washington who is the victim of harassment, intimidation or stalking. Whatever resources the priest needs, we will see to it that he is served. If radical gay activists want a showdown with the Catholic League, we will not disappoint them.

“The people of D.C. have a right to vote on the definition of marriage,” said Senior Legal Counsel Austin R. Nimocks of the Alliance Defense Fund, a group that helps defend religious liberty through legal action, whose attorneys are representing Jackson along with attorneys from Stand4MarriageDC.

He continued: “The D.C. Charter guarantees the people the right to vote, and the council cannot amend the charter for any reason, much less to deny citizens the right to vote. ADF will defend the right of the residents of our nation’s capitol to participate in a legitimate democratic process in the district.”

On September 1st, Stand4MarriageDC, headed by Jackson, had filed a petition that would allow DC citizens to vote on the following proposition: “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in the District of Columbia.”  Last Tuesday, however, the two-person D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics (DCBOEE) ruled that the proposed ballot “authorizes or would authorize discrimination proscribed by the HRA [the Human Rights Act]  and is therefore not a proper subject for initiative.”

The same day that the ballot was shot down the D.C. City Council scheduled a December 1st vote on the “Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Equality Amendment Act of 2009,” which would legalize homosexual “marriages” within the District of Columbia.  The measure is expected to pass easily.

The DCBOEE’s rejection of the action is not unexpected.  On June 15th, they rejected a similar referendum initiative that would have permitted voters to decide whether same-sex “marriages” from outside the District of Columbia would be recognized.

“We always believed we’d have to take it to Superior Court,” Jackson said after receiving a copy of the DCBOEE’s ruling. “We believe the board has a wrong interpretation of the Human Rights Act.”

The DC Human Rights Act of 1997 prohibits discrimination for “sexual orientation, [and] gender identity or expression” in a variety of areas, but never mentions marriage.  One section of the D.C. Code requires that ballot initiatives not violate this provision.

The petition to the D.C. Superior Court against the DCBOEE’s ruling, therefore, seeks a declaration that “the Initiative does not violate the HRA, because this Court and the Court of Appeals have consistently held that the regulation of the marital relationship falls outside the intended scope of the HRA.”

Furthermore, the petition argues against even the principle that the DCBOEE could reject the initiative for violating the HRA.  According to the petition, the section of the DC Code requiring the law be in accord with the HRA was “imposed by the [D.C.] Council on the people’s right of initiative [and] is an impermissible requirement not authorized by the Charter Amendment Act.”

The D.C. Charter acts as a constitution for the city of Washington.

“The Home Rule Charter tells us that we should have the same rights as the DC Board of Elections and as the DC City Council,” Jackson contends.  “In other words, if they can vote on something, we can vote on something.  If they can initiate a law, we should be able to initiate a law, as what is done in Maine and California.”

Not all members of the D.C. government agree with him.  D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, who supports same-sex marriage, said that he thought D.C. had a “fabulous council” to make decisions that D.C. citizens may not.

Wendy Wright, President of Concerned Women for America, criticized such an attitude: “The D.C. Council reeks of rank hypocrisy.  For years they have demanded that D.C. citizens should have the right to vote for congressional representation, which is in direct contradiction to the Constitution. Yet now they are denying D.C. citizens the right to vote on marriage, an institution so fundamental to America’s well-being that territories were not allowed to become states unless they kept marriage between one man and one woman.”

She continued: “D.C. officials are proving, once again, why they need congressional oversight.  They need to be reminded that citizens are not serfs.”

Malone spoke on Wednesday to the US Conference of Catholic Bishops at the Fall 2009 General Assembly after a presentation on four different video outreaches designed to teach people about the goodness and nature of natural marriage. The videos are part of a greater catechetical effort to explain why same-sex “marriage” is not a matter of civil rights, but harms the institution of marriage, the family, and religious liberty.

The Portland bishop thanked the USCCB for the just-approved document on marriage and defending the nature of true marriage. Malone said that the pastoral letter was “just what we need to be doing right now” in catechizing Catholics on marriage, saying that most have a shallow sense of what marriage actually is all about.

Malone said that he was grateful for his fellow Catholic bishops “prayer, encouragement, and financial support” and sharing the suffering that now comes with the territory of doing battle with same-sex “marriage” advocates.

“I am sorry to my brother bishops; because of your financial support you have been targeted for criticism,” he said.

Malone explained to the Assembly that Maine law requires that “any contribution to this kind of referendum fight over fifty dollars has to be reported to the state, and once it is, of course it is in the public domain.”

“People get it, and I know that some of you have got some pretty nasty criticism,” continued Malone. “We are in solidarity with that too, and I am very grateful to you for it.”

Maine’s public disclosure page indicates that eleven bishops sent in contributions in their own name, while forty-eight other bishops supported financially through their dioceses or diocesan offices by sending in sizable contributions to the “Yes on Question 1″ effort, the successful people’s veto of Maine’s same-sex “marriage” law.

Same-sex “marriage” advocates have used state public disclosure laws to find out who supported or contributed to pro-family efforts. Such efforts have lead to the publication of personal information - including names and addresses - of individuals whose names end up in the public domain by signing petitions or making financial contributions to pro-marriage initiatives for the purpose of intimidation, harassment, and even ostracism.

“The solidarity that I felt with all of you during this campaign was one of two great blessings,” he continued. “The other blessing for me was the grace that is ours by God’s graciousness through Holy Orders, the grace of Orders, the grace of [Episcopal] Office, which we all believe in.”

“I came to a new profound experience of that grace during this whole struggle, because I know that God gave me a kind of courage and perseverance and often even a serenity during this thing that I would not have had otherwise,” concluded Malone. “So there are blessings in the midst of struggles.”

Public-disclosure laws have proved a hazard to individuals and organizations that contribute or put their names to pro-family petitions. Mike Duke, CEO of Wal-Mart, and his wife Susan, were exposed by the homosexual group KnowThyNeighbor.org as signatories to a petition for a 2008 ballot initiative approved by Arkansas voters that restricted adoption and foster-parenting to married couples, excluding homosexual couples and other unmarried unions.

Petition-signers in California received threats of violence and intimidation from homosexual activists who used the state’s public disclosure database to identify backers of Proposition 8. One egregious example reported by the Los Angeles Times, involved the LAPD deploying in riot gear when the El Coyote restaurant in California came under siege by hundreds of pro-homosexual “marriage” protesters, because one website exposed the private $100 “Yes on 8″ contribution of the proprietor’s daughter.

The bishops applauded Malone after he concluded his gracious remarks.

The General Assembly then continued to hear input from several other bishops, including Bishop Galeone and Archbishop Wuerl, regarding the videos developed to catechize the young about the truth of marriage. Both bishops complemented the effectiveness of the videos’ catechetical message, with Archbishop Wuerl emphasizing that the word he gets from the Washington Archdiocese’s campus ministers is that the youth are badly informed about the true nature of marriage, and need catechizing first, before they can be receptive to political outreach.

The Stupak amendment, which was unexpectedly included in the final version of the House bill, restores the Hyde amendment ban on federal funds for elective abortion.

Fox News Channel correspondent Major Garrett asked Obama: “Will you sign legislation on health care that includes the Stupak language?”

OBAMA: You know, I think that there is a balance to be achieved that is consistent with the Hyde amendment — what existed before we reformed health care.

I believe in the basic idea that federal dollars shouldn’t pay for abortions. But I also think we shouldn’t restrict women’s choices, so, I think there’s some negotiations going on, not just on the Democratic side, but I think among people of good will on both sides, to see if we can arrive at something that meets that criteria and I’m confident we can do that.

GARRETT: Yes or no, does the Stupak language strike that balance?

OBAMA: Not yet.

White House Senior Advisor David Axelrod recently indicated to CNN that Obama would work to remove the Stupak language from the health care bill before it reaches the president’s desk.

Bishop Morin gave his report on CCHD to the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) Fall 2009 General Assembly in Baltimore.

"The bishops of the committee, as those responsible for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, continue to pledge ongoing support of efforts to ensure that all CCHD funds are used faithfully, effectively and in accord with Catholic social and moral teaching," said Morin.

CCHD is the subject of an independent and ongoing investigation by several Catholic groups that have exposed it for having contracted projects with some groups that are involved with or who have signed onto efforts, activities, or mission statements that conflict with the Catholic Church’s defense of the sanctity of life, marriage, and the family. CCHD has already defunded two of those groups, but further investigations are continuing to reveal numerous other problematic groups.

A Reform CCHD Now (RCN) coalition has formed that includes Human Life International, Bellarmine Veritas Ministry, Catholic Radio International, Americans Life League, and fifteen other groups. It has demanded concrete reforms of CCHD’s vetting process for groups seeking funds before Catholics are called upon to donate on November 22.

Regarding the criticism of CCHD, Bishop Morin told his fellow bishops that the charitable arm had experienced both fair and foul allegations about CCHD funding.

"Some [critics of CCHD] are motivated by a concern for the poor and respect for the Church, and some are seeking answers to legitimate questions about what and how and why CCHD does what it does, and how it can be made better," Morin said.

However, Morin proceeded to lash out at certain unnamed critics who he said harbor ulterior motives against the bishops and the Church.

"There are a few who have their own ideological or political agendas, they repeat or spread outrageous claims that the bishops are funding groups that are pro-abortion, groups that are not in support of the family, or other untruths," Morin insisted. "For these groups, this seems to be just another way to attack the Church and its shepherds."

Morin said that these groups, "constantly insist that the bishops are not as faithful to their responsibility to their caring for the life of the unborn."

Bishop Morin reiterated that CCHD is "absolutely pro-life from conception to natural death," and that social justice ministry to the poor was a form of pro-life advocacy.

He also denied the allegation that CCHD gives to any group "that is specifically involved in any activity contrary to church teaching," and emphasized that CCHD has a "zero tolerance" for grantees who violate the conditions of their contract, which requires respect and promotion of the Church’s core values.

Morin told the bishops that he believed that three "very particular isolated instances" were being used to paint CCHD and its 250 other grantees "with the same brush."

However, in recent days members of the Reform the CCHD Now movement have presented evidence for inappropriate activities on the part of a wide number of CCHD grantees, significantly widening the brush beyond the three cases of problematic funding alluded to by Morin.

On Monday, the day before Morin’s speech, the American Life League, an RCN member, revealed that they had discovered six more CCHD grantees engaged in activities contrary to Catholic teaching, such as promoting birth-control through sex-education, as well as Marxism, homosexuality, and greater access to condoms. In total these groups are allocated $220,000 for the year.

Michael Hichborn, ALL’s lead-researcher on CCHD, charged that given the ease with which they found the information on these groups, the bishops’ charitable organization could only be one of two things, either "incompetent or complicit."

"We’re finding more and more evidence every day with far less information than the CCHD receives through its granting process," stated Hichborn.

Hichborn and Rob Gasper, founder of BVM, both appeared Friday on EWTN’s "The World Over" program with Raymond Arroyo and argued their case for the needed reforms, explaining the evidence they had compiled, and revealing some new discoveries.

In his speech on Tuesday, Bishop Morin promised his fellow bishops that reform and "renewal" of its mission is in the works for CCHD, saying that even one case was one too many.

"We are using new tools to help ensure that groups keep their commitments, to avoid actions which conflict with Catholic Church teaching, and to not engage in any partisan political activity," Morin concluded.

Discussion on Morin’s report by the bishops, however, was tabled until Wednesday. Since the bishops did not discuss the CCHD report before the public session ended at 11 A.M., any discussion on the report will occur in their private session, which is closed off to reporters.

Thomas Cromwell: The rise and fall of Henry VIII’s most notorious minister by Robert Hutchinson. (New York : St. Martin’s Press. 360 pages. Hardback. ISBN 978-0-57794-0. $29.99.) Tells the story of Cardinal Wolsey’s fall from power over his failure to obtain a divorce from the Pope for Henry VIII who wanted to put away Catherine of Aragon so that he could marry Anne Boleyn and obtain a male heir. Cromwell then rose to power to become Henry’s most important minister. He assisted Henry to get rid of Anne Boleyn and to get new wives, Jane Seymour who died and then Anne of Cleves whom Henry divorced. Cromwell also helped Henry in financial and political matters which benefitted them both. Cromwell knew that he had to stay on Henry’s good graces or he would fall like Wolsey and others had done. He also assisted Henry in religious matters, but he was too liberal for Henry who still favored many Roman Catholic practices. This and Cromwell’s failure with the marriage of Anne of Cleves led to his downfall and his execution as a traitor.

Thomas Cromwell was a great organizer and administrator. Many of the ideas and methods he installed in the English government are still used by the British government of today. Greedy for power and wealth, he used his position to advance himself and his family. He was hated by the nobility who saw him as an upstart since he came from the poor class of England. He was corrupt and willing to do favors when a bribe was paid him. He held back some of the wealth from the dissolved monasteries and used some of it as bribes for others to keep them loyal to him. He was responsible for the destruction of many pieces of English art and architecture in order to get at the precious metals and jewels they were made of. He encouraged the destruction of many shrines in England like that of St. Thomas a Becket at Canterbury and St. Swithun and Winchester. He also destroyed some burial places of kings and queens, but Henry did not care as long as it brought him wealth. Cromwell was behind the martyrdom of many of the first English martyrs who are held today as saints or blessed.

Robert Hutchinson’s wonderful and entertaining book will keep the reader very interested and unwilling to put it down. Hutchinson uses quotes from various sources from Cromwell’s time period. He gives an equivalent for monetary amounts in his story so that the reader will have a better idea of how much money Cromwell was working with. There is a centerfold of color images. There are endnotes, a bibliography, and an index. There is a chronology and a list and short biography of major characters in the biography. The book jacket has an image of Thomas Cromwell, King Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn, and Hampton Court.

Another wonderful book about the same time period, and by the same author, is House of Treason: the rise and fall of a Tudor Dynasty (London : Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2009. 340 pages. Hardback. ISBN 978-0-297-84564-5. $32.77). This one is on the noble Howard family of England during the reign of the Tudors. This family was involved in the government of England because they were a high ranking family with royal blood which got some into trouble. The early dukes at times became too proud of their blood line and were seen as competitors with the King or Queen who were jealous of their prerogatives. This was because the Howards might have had a better claim to the throne than did the Tudors since they had Plantagenet connections. Some of the Dukes of Norfolk ran afoul of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I and were executed for treason. Hutchinson describes all the intrigues and excitement this family got into. One of the Howards, Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, died in the Tower of London after having becoming a Catholic and was canonized a saint in 1970 by Pope Paul VI. The Howard family continued to have Catholic leanings which got some into trouble with the government. This is where the book ends, with the advent of the reign of the Stuarts and the Howard family surviving the Tudors

Robert Hutchinson is an expert on the Reformation in England and Wales and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquities. He is an associate tutor in church archaeology at the University of Sussex’s Center (England) for Continuing Education and is the author of many papers. He is the author of The Last Days of Henry VIII (2006), Elizabeth’s Spymaster (2007).

As the woman walked down the sidewalk, I realized she was a bit disheveled. But there was nothing else to alert me to the fact that I had just brushed shoulders with one of the needy of my hometown.

Christ told his disciples, "The poor you will always have with you."

A priest put an interesting slant on that for me by explaining that Jesus wasn’t just saying the poor would always be around. No, Jesus meant that, if you’re a follower of his, the poor will always be with you, emphasis on the "with you." That’s what it means to be a Christian.

It was a blustery late-October day when I was caught unawares by the woman’s hurried gesture. I proceeded into the warmth of one of my favorite spots, a locally owned bookstore. But as I roamed the shelves, I couldn’t get that woman off my mind.

Back home, I’d been reading an old book called "Sweet Charity? Emergency Food and the End of Entitlement" by Janet Poppendieck. In some ways the book is outdated because it was written in the late 1990s.

But actually, it fits our current vicious economic hard times because it describes the food banks and emergency food kitchens of the ’90s and how they had burgeoned since the 1980s when there were relatively few. Now, they continue to proliferate.

Of course, the Great Depression fostered the sight of breadlines — something Americans thought of as a national disgrace. In the 1980s, when the worst recession to hit America since the Depression descended, it was the beginning of huge charitable endeavors to feed the hungry. Our national safety nets fell behind and continue to lag as we experience this dire recession.

At my parish, leading up to the first week of Advent, we are organizing what we call a "food stamp challenge." Those of us brave enough (or foolish enough) will commit to living a week on an average of $1.64 per meal — the equivalent of food stamp benefits.

We will spend the equivalent of a "mobile food pantry" voucher on vegetables, milk and perishables, and we will buy the equivalent of one U.S. Department of Agriculture commodity emergency food program package.

This means I will get a 3-ounce can of tuna and will, if I want to eat, be forced to buy one can of fruit cocktail and one can of green beans.

There will be no lattes, probably no coffee at all, because if I spend money on even the smallest can, it will cut deeply into my food allotment.

I will not be able to buy those large, economical containers from the warehouse stores, because the poor can’t afford to buy memberships and invest in economical quantities.

A friend may take me out to lunch once, but can’t spend more than $4.50 on me.

Why are we doing this challenge?

It will make us more aware of how adequate or inadequate the food is that is available to the nation’s hungry. It will also encourage us to be better advocates.

But mostly, it will open our eyes a tiny bit to what our citizens in poverty go through. It will awaken us to the kind of want we seldom experience. And for a week, it will keep the poor just a little bit more "with us."

The initiative petition, filed October 21 with the Secretary of State’s office, would amend the Nevada Constitution to read: "In the great state of Nevada, the term ‘person’ applies to every human being.  Article I Section 8 of the Nevada constitution states, ‘No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.’"

Nevada Life, Nevada Eagle Forum, Nevada Families and the Independent American Party, issued a joint statement opposing the Personhood initiative petition, saying the proposed constitution amendment "is so vague and general that it may not even apply to abortion at all."

"This amendment will harm the pro-life movement by giving pro-abortion courts more power to decide all matters relating to abortion such as parental notification, informed consent and taxpayer funding of abortion," the pro-life groups’ statement said. "These matters should be decided by the elected representatives of the people - state legislatures and Congress, not the unelected courts."

Considering the courts to be the "greatest threat to the unalienable right to life of the unborn," the pro-life groups believe the Personhood Initiative "will end up giving unlimited power to the courts to perpetuate and expand the disastrous effects of Roe v Wade and will interfere further with any legislative efforts to stop abortion."

Richard Ziser told the Las Vegas Sun that he believes the wording of the initiative petition is clear. The amendment will be voted on by the people and not imposed by the courts, hence the pro-life groups’ apprehension of giving "pro-abortion courts more power" is "another opinion and everybody has their own," he said.

Keith Mason, cofounder of Personhood USA, observed that "Personhood Nevada is embarking in a battle against the greatest evil of our day, the dehumanization of defenseless people," while fellow cofounder Cal Zastrow charged that the opposing pro-life groups, while working toward the same goal, believed in "curbing instances of abortion" through outreach and education, instead of outlawing abortion.

"Praise the Lord for the vision and courage of Personhood Nevada to really end the murdering of children! When asked what legal language they propose to protect all preborn children in Nevada, other groups have refused to come up with any, but Personhood Nevada does have legal language and a realistic plan." Zastrow said.

Gualberto Garcia Jones J.D., legal analyst for Personhood USA, said in a press release "there is nothing vague in stating that ‘all human beings shall be considered persons’, just like there is nothing vague in stating that all persons have the inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

Referring to the lawsuit filed against the sponsors of the Nevada Personhood Amendment initiative by Planned Parenthood (PP) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Garcia Jones pointed out that "Abortion proponents have sued to stop personhood amendments in Colorado, Missouri, and Nevada because they realize that personhood amendments have the power to unravel the web of legal fictions that impose abortion upon America."

Does The Washington Post really think that the death and destruction of 9/11 "could" be right, or "could" be wrong?

Liberals cannot stand it when the national media won’t simply declare contentious debates over and their viewpoint settled truth. Take, for example, the allegedly inevitable impending destruction of global warming. It is the left’s position that the media should conclude one side is right and the other wrong. Conservatives should be ignored when they object. But that’s a debate over the future. It’s grotesque for an American newspaper to publish a "news analysis" that stares 9/11 in the face and said it "could" be a matter of right and wrong.

The Post’s analyst was reporter Barton Gellman, the author of a hostile biography of Dick Cheney (so he does have some definite feelings about who’s evil, after all.) He began by noting the trial of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM for short) would make for "riveting drama." Attorney General Eric Holder proclaimed on PBS it would not be a "show trial," but Gellman echoed the headline: "both sides hope to use the case to define Sept. 11 as a parable of right and wrong."

One might dismiss the willful moral ignorance as a simple journalistic endorsement of anything done by Holder and President Obama. But it sends a clear signal of the differences between the Bush era and the Obama era, and the media’s obvious preference for the latter. Liberal journalists always admonished President Bush for his "arrogance" and "certitude," and this is what they meant: he remained certain that the Americans who died on 9/11 were victimized, and were denied their civil liberties in the most complete and horrific way.

Liberals, on the other hand, have such a talent for finding moral "complexities" that they wind up showing more outrage for the fact that KSM was waterboarded than for the fact that KSM successfully plotted the death of 3,000 Americans. While liberals beat their breasts at the outrageous prospect of KSM being tried by a military commission, most Americans would prefer hustling KSM to the top of the Empire State Building or the Statue of Liberty and throwing him off.

Putting KSM on trial in a courtroom just blocks from his "accomplishment" is a decision that Holder and Obama made not in the interests of justice, but in the interests of flashiness, showing "the eyes of the world" in the most attention-grabbing, and increasingly tiresome way possible, that they are in no way comparable to Bush.

Liberals find "world opinion" to be a much more desirable and cosmopolitan standard than the worldview of simple-minded Americans. In the Post, Gellman quoted Georgetown law professor David Cole, without even calling him a "liberal," let alone what he should really be called, a radical defender of the civil liberties of terrorists. Cole argued that this trial marks a "sea change," that the sentencing will be "seen around the world as legitimate and not fixed," since the "world" thinks military commissions would be fixed.

Journalists don’t seem to consider whether "the world" is qualified to judge America as right or wrong, when "the world" is full of thuggish regimes that aren’t a fraction as punctilious as Americans are about the rule of law. Should the butchers of Tiananmen Square get to judge us? Should the Russians get to complain after their consolidation of power in the wake of the 2004 Beslan school massacre by radical Islamists? How about most of Europe, Great Britain and a handful of others excepted, that has redefined moral cowardice in the face of radical Islam? They should judge us, too?

Why can’t our media have enough respect for facts and for their fellow countrymen that we can all see a mass-murderer like KSM as a much greater villain than say, our naked-pyramid builders at Abu Ghraib? Will our media show 9/11 footage during this trial near Ground Zero with as much repetitive ardor as they bombarded us with Abu Ghraib clips in 2004?

It’s much more likely that they’ll wonder, in that wonderfully neutral way of theirs, whether Americans or terrorists will "control the narrative." And then we can get back to real problems, like the plight of the kangaroo rat.

It had single buttons that played whole chords. Other buttons played cymbals, marimba and other rhythmic beats.

I spent hours playing the thing. My father, too — his fingers are so big he had trouble playing just one key at a time — played it often.

And at family gatherings, my mother and her siblings would stand around it for hours, singing holiday tunes and other well-known standards.

I had no idea then how technological innovation made our living-room organ possible.

Harvey Olsen, a retired electrical engineer, electronics instructor and organ expert, told me about the history of the home organ.

In 1933, Lawrence Hammond, an inventor and high-end clock maker, got into the organ business. His goal was to produce a mechanical instrument that replicated the sound of a pipe organ.
Hammond’s very first organs consisted of spinning wheels — tone generators — and lots of other electromechanical parts. The machines were extremely well built and many are still functioning today.

By the mid-1950s, however, organ makers began replicating the organ sound with lower-cost vacuum-tube technology — tubes that looked and acted like light bulbs. It was much less costly to create tones electronically than with lots of mechanical parts.

By the late ’60s, vacuum tubes gave way to even-lower-cost transistor technology. The transistors were small, inexpensive and reliable. They enabled the development of compact integrated circuit boards — the electronic gizmos made it possible to produce more sophisticated sounds, such as a marimba beat.

They also allowed organs to be produced cheaply.

And so it was that the ’60s and early ’70s became the heyday of the home organ. Hammond, a high-end organ maker, soon found competition from low-cost producers, such as Lowrey, Thomas and Kimball.

Every mall had an organ store staffed with organ-playing sales representatives. They seduced thousands of suburban dads, such as mine, into digging into their wallets to bring organ music into their living rooms — something that had been unimaginable to my father as he grew up during the Depression years.

To be sure, our old Kimball organ brought us many hours of amusement. As sophisticated as we thought it was in the ’70s, we would have been shocked had we known what organs would be able to do by 2009.

Digital technology has revolutionized the organ, as it has everything else. Today, for significantly less than my father paid for our Kimball in the ’70s, a fellow can buy a digital organ that produces incredible sounds.

If you’re traveling in Europe and come across a pipe organ in a medieval church, you can probably buy a “sampling” software program that allows you to reproduce its exact sound in your living room.

In any event, we’ve had so much technological innovation in America that we take it for granted, but we do so at our own peril.

The fact is, innovators and entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of our economy. We need their inventions, many of them not yet known, to resolve a multitude of challenges we face — to produce the wealth we need to cover our bills.

Government spending is tying up needed capital and a proposed increase in capital gains taxes will only punish success and inhibit investment in new ideas. Shouldn’t the government do everything possible to unleash innovation — rather than quell it?

Where America’s innovators and entrepreneurs are concerned, can’t we strike a better chord?