VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Four conservative Roman Catholic cardinals on Monday made a rare public challenge to Pope Francis over some of his teachings in a major document on the family, accusing him of sowing confusion on important moral issues.
The cardinals – two Germans, an Italian, and an American – said they had gone public with their letter to the pope because he had not responded.
The pope has clashed before with conservatives who worry he is weakening Roman Catholic rules on moral issues such as homosexuality and divorce while focusing on social problems such as climate change and economic inequality.
At issue are some of the teachings in a 260-page treatise called “Amoris Laetitia” (The Joy of Love), a cornerstone document of Francis’ attempt to make the 1.2 billion-member Church more inclusive and less condemning.
In the document, issued in April, he called for a Church that was less strict and more compassionate towards any “imperfect” members, such as those who divorced and remarried, saying “no one can be condemned forever”.
Most critics have focused on what the pope’s letter said about the full re-integration into the Church of members who divorce and remarry in civil ceremonies.
Ridgewood NJ, Maura McMahon DeNicola has announced on Facebook that she will be seeking the vacant seat created by the departure of Assemblyman Scott Rumana in NJ District 40.
DeNicola stated, “Well Friends, after serious consideration and support, I’m in! I am seeking election to the Vacant Seat created by the departure of Assemblyman Scott Rumana in NJ District 40. I very much look forward to connecting with all of the dedicated D40 County Committee members before the November 22nd vacancy vote.”
For those that have not had the pleasure of meeting Maura has long list of local leadership positions :
Bergen County Freeholder
Trustee Neighbors Helping Neighbors
Mayor of Franklin Lakes
Councilwoman Franklin Lakes
Member Board of Trustees Neighbors Helping Neighbors
Former Member Board of Trustees Don Bosco Prep
Former Member Franklin Lakes Board of Education
Member Franklin Lakes Planning Board
Member Bergen County Mayors Association and Northwest Bergen Mayors Association
Maura’s was educated at Boston College, B.A., graduated magna cum laude and recieved and M.A. from Columbia University.
Maura has been Married to Philip, 29 years with 4 children,Philip, Graduate U.S. Naval Academy, Lieutenant U.S. Navy
Paul, Graduate Leonard N. Stern School of Business at the New York University,Conor, Automotive Mechanic
Lucia, Freshman, Villanova University
By Larry Higgs | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
on November 14, 2016 at 8:56 AM, updated November 14, 2016 at 5:22 PM
A strange thing is happening in the world of gas prices.
Discount prices at some gas stations aren’t such a discount anymore and are being separated by less than a dime a gallon from gas prices at some name brand stations.
Naturally, the caveat in finding those prices is smart shopping and access to a state highway with a selection of gas stations. But the numbers are bearing this out, which can be seen by checking the map on GasBuddy.com before getting behind the wheel.
A survey of gas station on Route 22 in Union on Friday yielded a Sunoco and an Exxon priced at $2.19 a gallon, within seven cents a gallon of an unbranded Fuel Stop. Route 28 in Cranford was a little higher, with a Sunoco priced at $2.25 while a generic station named “Gas” was at $2.15, GasBuddy reported.
Paramus NJ, Paramus firefighters battled a multiple alarm fire at Denny Wiggers Landscaping, 387 Paramus Road, Paramus on Monday morning, 11/14. The structure involved was declared uninhabitable due to fire, smoke and water damage. All occupants safely evacuated the building prior to the arrival of fire department personnel. Paramus Road was closed in both directions near the incident scene. Paramus PD and EMS personnel also responded to the scene in force. Fire and rescue personnel from nearby municipalities staffed Paramus FD and Rescue Squad locations during the incident and provided relief at the fire scene.
Pension liabilities and revenue loss from lower taxes are cited
By
KATE KING
Updated Nov. 14, 2016 6:18 p.m. ET
S&P Global Ratings cut its rating for New Jersey’s general-obligation bonds Monday, marking the state’s 10th credit downgrade under Republican Gov. Chris Christie.
The downgrade stemmed from the state’s rising pension liabilities along with an expected drop in revenue as part of a transportation-funding package signed by Mr. Christie, said David Hitchcock, senior director at S&P Global.
The New York ratings, data and index firm lowered New Jersey’s credit rating to “A-” from “A” and assigned a negative outlook.
“Just as the state is pushing off some of their pensions costs into later years, they are also pushing off some of their revenue loss into later years,” Mr. Hitchcock said. “It’s adding incremental pressure.”
Credit ratings help determine the interest rates that states pay when they sell bonds; a lower credit rating means higher borrowing costs.
Three-quarters of certified public accountants in New Jersey have advised clients to leave the state because of the estate and inheritance taxes, according to the head of the New Jersey Society of CPAs.
That tax is ending – and so is the advice, even before the law is off the books, said Ralph Albert Thomas, the CPA group’s chief executive officer and executive director.
“Not only our members, but I know estate attorneys have been sending out correspondence about, look, they need to reconvene with their clients to relook at what they proposed,” Thomas said.
The survey found 83 percent of respondents felt estate and inheritance taxes had prompted clients to leave New Jersey. A follow-up survey is planned for the spring, to see how much the advice has changed.
The estate tax is paid on approximately 3,500 estates annually, around 5 percent of the approximately 70,000 deaths in the state each year.
Currently, New Jersey’s estate tax threshold is $675,000. The full value of any estates worth more than that is taxed. That will be changed to a $2 million exclusion at the start of 2017 – meaning, for instance, that an estate worth $2.5 million would be taxed on the $500,000 over the excluded amount.
The tax is then eliminated entirely at the start of 2018.
Veterans Day celebration at Paramus Park Mall included a Flash Mob by the Orpheus Club Men’s Chorus featuring patriotic songs.
November 15,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Paramus NJ, The Paramus Park Mall was the scene on Saturday, November 12, 2016, of a flash mob staged in honor of veterans and Veterans Day by the Orpheus Club Men’s Chorus. The performance began as Orpheus tenor Charles Brown of Hackensack stepped out alone in the atrium beneath the food court, and sang the opening words of “America the Beautiful” to the unsuspecting crowd of shoppers nearby. Quickly, he was joined by other singers until the full chorus had formed. Before long a large crowd of shoppers stood by as the Chorus’ voices swelled with patriotic fervor and filled the atrium with their second song, “God Bless America.”
Many shoppers sang along. More than a few onlookers had tears in their eyes. Some stated that they were thrilled to feel once again uncomplicated patriotism without faction or partisan discord. It was a pure, magical moment with no agenda save to honor those who served. To that end Orpheus accomplished its mission.
The Orpheus Club Men’s Chorus has been a keystone of the cultural life of the region for 106 years. Founded in 1909, it is the oldest cultural institution in all of Bergen County. Now almost 50 voices strong, the Orpheus Club Men’s Chorus is directed by John Palatucci and accompanied by pianist Ron Levy.
Your next chance to hear Orpheus perform will be at their Gala Holiday Concerts on Saturday, December 17, 2016 at 7:30 pm, and on Sunday, December 18, 2016 at 4:00 pm, both at the Ridgewood United Methodist Church, 100 Dayton Street, in downtown Ridgewood. Tickets for these concerts may be purchased online, with a 20% advance purchase discount, at the Orpheus website: www.ridgewoodorpheusclub.org.
PSE&G teams with more than 80 North American utilities to stop scams
November 15th 2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, more than 3 million consumers filed fraud complaints last year. Phone scams are among the most common complaints. To combat these con artists, Public Service Electric and Gas Company (PSE&G), New Jersey’s largest utility, joined forces with more than 80 energy companies across North America to educate people how to spot a scam. The collaborative designated the third Wednesday in November
“Utilities United Against Scams Day.”
How the most common payment scam works:
Someone pretending to be a utility employee calls and threatens shut-off within an hour if they do not receive immediate payment via a prepaid card.
Victims are given a phony phone number to call back after they purchase the cards from a retail store.
When the customer calls back, they may hear voice response prompts that mimic those they would hear when calling a real customer service line. Some of these criminals use caller ID spoofing technology to replicate PSE&G’s number.
A fake representative asks for the numbers on the prepaid card or receipt. Within seconds the money is gone.
Scam red flags:
The caller becomes angry and aggressive, telling the customer his or her account is past due and service will be disconnected if a large payment isn’t made – often within less than an hour.
The thief specifically demands the customer pay with a prepaid card or wire transfer.
“If a caller directs you to go to a local store to purchase a prepaid card to pay your bill, it is likely a scam,” said Greg Dunlap, PSE&G vice president of customer operations. “If you receive a call and are in doubt, hang up and call us at the phone number listed on our website or your PSE&G bill.”
The only way to protect against these scams is for customers to be cautious. Before terminating service, PSE&G alerts customers in a number of ways: messages on their bill, letters and phone calls. While the utility accepts credit cards, prepaid cards and money transfers to pay bills, PSE&G would never demand a specific type of payment and threaten immediate service termination.
“Hiding behind an untraceable phone, scammers know it is doubtful they’ll be caught,” said Dunlap. “By educating people how to spot a scam, our Utilities United collaborative aims to spare many would-be victims and make the thieves’ underhanded jobs a lot harder.”
Report all scam attempts by calling your utility and local police department, and file a complaint with the FTC at www.ftc.gov/complaint.
As I watched last week as protesters took to the streets in big cities, what struck me was the vast and growing divide between America’s rural and urban populations and their politics and sensibilities. One look at county maps of this year’s election results and you see what looks like a handful of blueberries sprinkled on an endless spread of red sauce (between the blue coasts). And yet, it is likely that the final result will be that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, although Donald Trump won the electoral vote and therefore the election. Part of the reason for this is that, as a census report noted last year: “U.S. cities are home to 62.7 percent of the U.S. population but comprise just 3.5 percent of land area.”
Etc Charles Blow New York Times
Letter comment selection
Quote “Charles, there is this little thing called social media, you should check it out sometime. It’s allowed the average person to communicate directly with one another and share THEIR ideas without the pompous, narrow viewed opinions of some Liberal elite.
For decades you and yours were able to get away with controlling the narrative by virtue of having the only relevant soapboxes in town. Fast forward to today and you see a completely different landscape for information sharing, one in which ideas are exchanged at the speed of light free of media controlled bias.
Trump won the election because when people compared the dialogue that they were having with one another to your Liberal prism, they realized that they were no longer being represented.
Trump for ALL his flaws recognized and exploited this to great effect.”
A lot of people are walking into Raghavan Mayur’s office in Ramsey these days to ask how he conducts polls.
To answer, Mayur sometimes reaches into a canvas bag and pulls out a college composition notebook with a creased black-and-white cover. He opens it to reveal pages of wide-lined paper, each covered in a hand-drawn chart summarizing the results from the previous day’s polling.
BY HANNAN ADELY AND PATRICIA ALEX
STAFF WRITERS |
THE RECORD
At dinner tables, in classrooms and in counseling offices, adults are grappling with how to help young people work through their anxieties and emotions in the aftermath of the divisive presidential election.
In colleges, students lined up for counseling sessions and sought out peers for support at meetings and at rallies.
Ridgewood NJ, After a lifetime of working hard and saving faithfully, some people just want to enjoy retirement and spend their money without worrying about passing on anything to the next generation.
But plenty of others are determined to leave a legacy – whether it’s by bequeathing a tidy sum to their children and grandchildren, or bestowing a beloved charity with a parting donation.
Not everyone, though, takes the necessary steps to accomplish their goals.
“Don’t assume everything you have left when you die will go to your children or to your favorite cause,” says Stephanie Fullerton, president and co-founder of Fullerton Financial Planning Group and author of Living a Happy, Healthy and Inspired Retirement (www.Fullertonfp.com).
“Taxes and other costs can eat away at your legacy.”
That’s why it’s important to have a financial plan in place to help make sure as much of your wealth as possible ends up in the right hands.
It’s wise to seek professional advice from those who can guide you through the options, Fullerton says. Among some of the things to consider:
• A will. Everyone knows about wills, at least in theory, but that doesn’t mean they take the time to visit with an attorney and have one drawn up. A Harris Poll last year reported that 64 percent of Americans don’t have wills. • An IRA. Many people think of an IRA as the nest egg that will help them survive retirement, but these accounts also are one of the largest types of assets inherited by beneficiaries. If you don’t anticipate needing your IRA money in retirement, Fullerton says, you might consider a legacy-planning strategy that will help reduce taxes and increase the payout your beneficiaries will inherit upon your death. • Trusts. There are many different types of trusts, and they can be complex to set up and execute. However, a trust can be a flexible and advantageous means to transfer your assets in the future, Fullerton says. Most trusts also provide current benefits, such as tax-deferral and deductions. Unlike a will, a trust will avoid probate upon your death, but a trust is also more expensive to prepare. A qualified estate-planning attorney who specializes in these matters can explain more.
Before you get started on a plan, Fullerton suggests thinking about what types of gifts you want to leave to others – and it doesn’t have to be just money.
“It can be items you own, such as your house, a favorite work of art, special dishes used at every family gathering or a family heirloom,” she says.
You don’t even have to wait until you die, Fullerton says. Experiences also can be a legacy, such as taking a special trip each year with a different grandchild to give them memories that will last not only your lifetime, but theirs as well.
About Stephanie Fullerton
Stephanie Fullerton, author of Living a Happy, Healthy and Inspired Retirement (www.Fullertonfp.com), is president and co-founder of Phoenix-based Fullerton Financial Planning. She and her husband, Steve, an investment adviser with Kingdom Financial Group, work together to assist clients in protecting their retirement savings and to create an income stream that will last a lifetime. She is featured on two weekly radio shows and frequently appears on local television.
Investment advisory services offered through Kingdom Financial Group, LLC, an SEC Registered Investment Advisor.
President-elect Donald Trump announced Sunday that Reince Priebus will serve as his chief of staff, while Stephen Bannon will serve as chief strategist and senior counselor.
Priebus is currently the chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC), while Bannon was the chief executive officer of Trump’s campaign.
Bannon previously served as the chairman of Breitbart News, an “alt-right” news site that supported Trump’s bid.
“Steve and Reince are highly qualified leaders who worked well together on our campaign and led us to a historic victory. Now I will have them both with me in the White House as we work to make America great again,” Trump said in a statement.
We all know sleep matters for job performance. After a week of vacation, you may find your work better than ever. But rack up a week of sleepless nights — say, following a polarizing presidential election — and you may find yourself struggling.
It wouldn’t surprise anyone that sleep affects attention, memory and cognition — important factors in the workplace. But striking new research suggests the effect of additional sleep has a high monetary value. Apaper — from Matthew Gibson of Williams College and Jeffrey Shrader of the University of California at San Diego, based on data from Jawbone, the fitness- and sleep-tracker company — says that additional time sleeping can translate into thousands of dollars in wages.
In fact, they calculate that a one-hour increase in weekly sleep raises wages by about half as much as an additional year of education.
