Soliloquy

Breaking bones and Blood Clots

2010-07-15T16:48:00.000-04:00

Hello all!

I know it's been a while. There's a good reason beyond my usual laziness this time. I ended up in the emergency room in the early morning of July 4th. I had a broken hip and knee which brought on a nice huge blood clot in my leg as well. Needless to say, I was admitted tot he hospital immediately.

Turns out they can't do a thing for my broken bones because of advanced osteoporosis in my legs due to my being paraplegic. They just have to knit and heal on their own. The blood clot can't be treated as usual either due to my hereditary condition which could cause me to hemorrhage and bleed internally. Instead they put in a filter so any large clot that might break free would be unable to travel to my lungs or heart and kill me. I was glad of that and had been contemplating the need for one anyway due to my hereditary condition which tends to make clots especially as I get older.

So, I'm an official old lady now, LOL. I have my first broken hip! They wanted to send my to a nursing facility for a month or two while my hip heals but the insurance company said "no". So, I'm home now and on complete bed rest. No getting up for any reason beyond a house fire. My wonderful husband bought me a beautiful lap top, which I am using right now, so I could stay connected, watch movies, etc and not go out of my ever loving mind from boredom. I'll be in bed until the end of August as the least. If x-rays show my hip to be fairly mended I'll be allowed up after that time. I get to lay in bed, be waited on hand and foot, do no housework at all.....hmmmmm.......I should have broken this hip sooner! Just kidding.

I'm sure I'll go a bit stir crazy and I'm bummed that I'll basically be missing my entire summer being stuck indoors but I'm not feeling at all depressed about it. I thought I'd be a lot more upset than I am but I think God has given me this great feeling of peaceful acceptance. Knowing it's temporary helps, I'm sure. I don't like the idea that I need help with more intimate issues due to not being allowed to get up for any reason. My husband is a wonderful man who hasn't made me feel embarrassed about it but I still have a certain amount of pride and vanity. It's incredibly humiliating to not even be able to do some of the basic things in private. I try not to let those thoughts mess with my sense of self too much but it can be hard at times. I'm just grateful that I am married to a man who is able and willing to handle some of the more distasteful aspects of this situation with such compassion. I'm am truly blessed to have him in my life and I hope he knows that if the situation were reversed, he could feel as safe with me in this type of thing as I know I am with him. The vows we took to care for each other through good and bad, sickness and health were not arbitrary words to us but sacred and solemn.

A Godly Man

2010-07-01T13:28:00.000-04:00

Image by RecycledStarDust via Flickr

I know It's been way way too long since I posted here. I think I'm spreading myself a wee bit thin in the blog-o-sphere, lol. But, as I promised, this post is a Biblical perspective on what it means to be a Godly man.

Nothing sums it up better than a book called, 10 Disciplines of a Godly Man by R. Kent Hughes. A summary of these is below. I found this summary at: http://www.hopeway.org/gospel/10DisciplinesOfGodlyMan.asp.

Men, we will never get anywhere in life without discipline, and doubly so in spiritual matters. None of us is inherently righteous, so Paul’s instructions regarding spiritual discipline in 1 Timothy 4:7-8 take on personal urgency: “Train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.”

That word “train” comes from the Greek word from which we derive gymnasium. So, I invite you into God’s Gym—to some pain and great gain!
Discipline of Purity

Sensuality is the biggest obstacle to godliness among Christian men. The fall of King David should not only instruct us but scare the sensuality right out of us! Fill yourself with God’s Word—memorize passages like 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8, Job 31:1, Proverbs 6:27, Ephesians 5:3-7, and 2 Timothy 2:22. Find someone who will help you keep your soul faithful to God.

A pure mind is impossible if you mindlessly watch TV and movies or visit pornographic web sites (1 Thessalonians 4:3-7). Develop the divine awareness that sustained Joseph: “How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” (Genesis 39:9).
Discipline of Relationships

To be all God wants you to be, put some holy sweat into your relationships! If you’re married, you need to live out Ephesians 5:25-31: “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (v. 25). For those who are fathers, God provides a workout in one pungent sentence: “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4).

Relationships are not optional (Hebrews 10:25); they enable us to develop into what God wants us to be and most effectively learn and live God’s truth.
Discipline of Mind

The potential of possessing the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16) introduces the scandal of today’s church—Christians who do not think Christianly, leaving our minds undisciplined. The Apostle Paul understood this well: “…whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” (Philippians 4:8). Each ingredient is a matter of personal choice.

You can never have a Christian mind without reading the Scriptures regularly because you cannot be influenced by that which you do not know.
Discipline of Devotion

Reading God’s Word is essential, but meditation internalizes the Word and responds, “I desire to do your will, O my God” (Psalm 40:8). Beyond instructions like Ephesians 6:18-20, there are two great reasons to pray. The more we expose our lives to the white-hot sun of Christ’s righteous life, the more his image will be burned into our character. The second reason is that prayer bends our wills to God’s will.

Many men never have an effective devotional life because they never plan for it; they never expose their lives to his pure light.
Discipline of Integrity

We can hardly overstate the importance of integrity to a generation of believers so much like the world in ethical conduct. But integrity’s benefits—character, a clear conscience, deep intimacy with God—argue its importance.

We must let God’s Word draw our lines of conduct. Our speech and actions must be intentionally true (Proverbs 12:22; Ephesians 4:15), backed by the courage to keep our word and stand up for our convictions (Psalm 15:4). An old saying sums it up: “Sow an act, reap a habit. Sow a habit, reap a character. Sow a character, reap a destiny.”(1)
Discipline of Tongue

“If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless” (James 1:26). The true test of a man’s spirituality is not his ability to speak, but rather his ability to bridle his tongue!

Offered to God on the altar, the tongue has awesome power for good. There must be an ongoing prayerfulness and resolve to discipline ourselves: “Who keeps the tongue doth keep his soul.”(2)
Discipline of Work

We meet God, the Creator, as a worker in Genesis 1:1–2:2. Since “God created man in his own image” (1:27), the way we work will reveal how much we allow the image of God to develop in us.

There is no secular/sacred distinction; all honest work ought to be done to the glory of God (1 Corinthians 10:31). We must recover the biblical truth that our vocation is a divine calling and thus be liberated to do it for the glory of God.
Discipline of Perseverance

Hebrews 12:1-3 presents a picture of perseverance in four commands.

Divest! “Lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely” (v. 1a). That includes besetting sin, and anything else that hinders.

Run! “…with endurance the race that is set before us” (v. 1b). Each of us can finish our race (see also 2 Timothy 4:7).

Focus! “Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (v. 2). There never was a millisecond that he did not trust the Father.

Consider! Our life is to be spent considering how Jesus lived (v. 3).
Discipline of Church

You don’t have to go to church to be a Christian; you don’t have to go home to be married. But in both cases if you do not, you will have a very poor relationship!

You will never attain your full spiritual manhood, nor will your family reach its spiritual maturity without commitment to the church. Find a good church, join it, and commit yourself to it wholeheartedly. Your participation should include financial support, but it should also include giving your time, talents, expertise, and creativity to the glory of God.
Discipline of Giving

How can we escape the power of materialism? By giving from a heart overflowing with God’s grace, like the believers in Macedonia who “gave themselves first to the Lord” (2 Corinthians 8:5): this is where grace giving must begin.

Giving disarms the power of money. Though giving should be regular, it should also be spontaneous and responsive to needs. And it should be joyous—“God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7). And Jesus said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).

As we sweat out the disciplines of a godly man, remember, with Paul, what energizes us to live them out—“not I, but the grace of God that is with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10).

The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, Second Edition, (London: Oxford UP, 1959), p. 405.

James S. Hewitt, ed., Illustrations Unlimited (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House, 1988), p. 475.

I Haven't Forgotten

2010-05-28T02:41:00.002-04:00

I've been sick this past week with my old enemy "migraine". It's almost gone now...just in time for the weekend. Yay! I haven't forgotten I owe a blog post on "What is a Godly Man/Husband?". I'm going to try to catch up on some much needed cleaning on Friday but perhaps that evening or this weekend I'll get my rear in gear and get to this blog.

What is a Godly Wife?

2010-05-21T02:07:00.007-04:00

Image by jcoterhals via Flickr

What exactly does it mean to be a and a "Godly" woman and wife? I've been re-asking myself this question as of late. The best place to go for those answers are, of course, the Holy Word of God. So, that's the study I decided to do and it's brought my to my knees with tears in my eyes. Some of it is me being far too hard on myself, I know. But...part of it isn't. Let me share some of the things the Word of God has to say about what a Godly wife is, what she does, how she acts etc. and how these verses spoke to me

Genesis 2:18 (New International Version)
The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."

I, as a wife, am to be a helper, a help mate to my husband. I am to help -him-. Does this mean he's not supposed to lend a helping hand by washing a dish? LOL No. But it -does- mean that it is my duty to be of help to -him- and not to myself first and foremost.

Ephesians 5:22-24 and 5:33(New King James Version)
22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body. 24 Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything.
33 Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

Many women, even Christian women these days, balk at these particular verses. But, if I truly want to follow my God, I will follow His will. Of course there are verses that tell a husband exactly how he is to treat his wife. When those verses are combined with the ones I cite here, the marriage is mutually respectful and mutually fulfilling. Neither spouse is taking advantage of the other. As a Godly wife, I am called to submit to my husband. As I trust and respect my husband...and as he is also a Godly man...this is shouldn't be hard to do! I have to admit that sometimes it's very hard to do, LOL. It's not hard because my husband is being unreasonable or unloving. It's hard because I am putting my "self" first. I am more concerned with getting my own way than with being a Godly wife. Somehow I allow the sin of self love and self pride to come before love of God and love of my husband.

If my husband were in some way requiring me to go against Godly behavior, or were using violence, etc...then of course, I'm not about to "submit" myself to this. The people who think that the Word implies that a woman should tolerate abuse are mistaken. Physical, emotional, mental abuse is dealt with in the following verses that come directly after the ones telling a woman to submit to her husband. They say this:

Ephesians 5:25-33 (New King James Version)
25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, 26 that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, 27 that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. 28 So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. 30 For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones. 31 “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32 This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church. 33 Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

Notice how husbands are told to love their wives as themselves and as Christ loves the church? No man who loves himself will then hit himself, abuse himself, etc. So the Word of God indicates that -both-spouses are required to behave in specific ways.

Proverbs 31:10-31 (New King James Version)

10 Who can find a virtuous wife?
For her worth is far above rubies.
11 The heart of her husband safely trusts her;
So he will have no lack of gain.
12 She does him good and not evil
All the days of her life.
13 She seeks wool and flax,
And willingly works with her hands.
14 She is like the merchant ships,
She brings her food from afar.
15 She also rises while it is yet night,
And provides food for her household,
And a portion for her maidservants.
16 She considers a field and buys it;
From her profits she plants a vineyard.
17 She girds herself with strength,
And strengthens her arms.
18 She perceives that her merchandise is good,
And her lamp does not go out by night.
19 She stretches out her hands to the distaff,
And her hand holds the spindle.
20 She extends her hand to the poor,
Yes, she reaches out her hands to the needy.
21 She is not afraid of snow for her household,
For all her household is clothed with scarlet.
22 She makes tapestry for herself;
Her clothing is fine linen and purple.
23 Her husband is known in the gates,
When he sits among the elders of the land.
24 She makes linen garments and sells them,
And supplies sashes for the merchants.
25 Strength and honor are her clothing;
She shall rejoice in time to come.
26 She opens her mouth with wisdom,
And on her tongue is the law of kindness.
27 She watches over the ways of her household,
And does not eat the bread of idleness.
28 Her children rise up and call her blessed;
Her husband also, and he praises her:
29 “ Many daughters have done well,
But you excel them all.”
30 Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing,
But a woman who fears the LORD, she shall be praised.
31 Give her of the fruit of her hands,
And let her own works praise her in the gates.

Wow! That's a lot to live up to and if I read it all at once I tend to feel like saying "What is heck? Are you saying I basically have to be some kind of frigging slave or work-a-holic until I drop over from sheer exhaustion?!" LOL. This is when it's best to take it slow and really read it for overall message. What it's saying here is that a Godly wife isn't lazy. She's not afraid of hard work when it comes to caring for her husband and children. She puts her family first and works hard to make sure they are well cared for. More literalism-styled readers will often say that this means a good wife should be able to sew, farm, and doesn't ever sit down to rest during the day or evening. My response to that is to point out Christ's rather dim view of the Pharisees who also were stickler's for the letter of the law rather than the heart of it. But it -does- mean that if I'm sitting around all day, doing little to nothing, I am -not- being a Godly wife.

Now, this is where I start being hard on myself. I suffer from fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome and am also a severe migraine sufferer. This tends to get in the way a -lot- of my ability to work as I would like in the house. I have already been forced to stop working out of the house due to these issues and having my ability to work within my home being limited by these ailments really freaks me out. I am literally fighting with a deep self anger over it. I -want- to be a good wife! I -want- to be a Godly wife! I -want- to take care of my home and my husband properly! I feel disgusted and a real sense of near self-loathing often for not somehow pushing through the pain and exhaustion. I know I am likely being too hard on myself but it BUGS ME! I feel like a complete failure as a wife due to this and I want so much for things to be different. I have to be careful that I don't allow the devil to use this as a weapon against me but, I'll admit, it's darned difficult.

I'm actually going to be going to the doctor and perhaps a specialist as well concerning my fibromyalgia. It's true that very very low doses of steroids have the effect of counteracting much of the pain of this condition without having all of the horrid side effects we read about in those who take it at average and high doses. I'm also trying to lose a bit of extra weight in the effort of taking some of the stress off my body. I have 20 pounds to go! Okay, onward...

Generally just those few verses pretty well describe what a Godly wife is. They are as valid today as they were when written. In order for Christian women to be a real blessing to their husbands and to bring honor to God, their husbands and themselves, it's important that they understand what is expected of them. Yes, it's a high standard. No, it's not necessarily easy. Yes, we are taught in today's world to "fight" for equality and all that but what we often fail to recognize is that if a Godly woman -and- a Godly man follow the precepts set for them, their marriage will be strong, beautiful, mutually respectful and enduring.

The next time I'll write about what the Word of God has to say about being a Godly man and husband. After that, I'll talk about a Godly marriage.

Different Drug Problem........

2010-05-15T00:54:00.002-04:00

Supreme Court Nominee - Kagan

2010-05-11T02:09:00.004-04:00

Image by Harvard Law Record via Flickr

Kagan: Some speech can be 'disappeared'
Wanted 'societal costs' counted against 1st Amendment rights

Posted: May 10, 2010
9:10 pm Eastern

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=152305

In her few academic papers, Kagan evidences strong beliefs for court intervention in speech, going so far as to posit First Amendment speech should be weighed against "societal costs.”

In a 1996 paper, "Private Speech, Public Purpose: The Role of Governmental Motive in First Amendment Doctrine," Kagan argued it may be proper to suppress speech because it is offensive to society or to the government.

Am I the only one who sees a problem with this? Is this the type of person we -want- sitting on our Supreme Court?

Why don't we just burn our constitution or use it as toilet paper while we're at it, Ms Kagan!

Just a typical day

2010-05-07T20:05:00.004-04:00

Image via Wikipedia

I got together with a wonderful friend from college yesterday evening. We've been friends for near on 25 years now and there's not much we don't share or know about each other. We went to a local restaurant and stayed for about 3 hours just talking up a storm. We don't live all that far from each other but life and schedules get hectic so it's been about a year since we've been able to get together face to face. I had so much fun and it was so nice to talk to someone who sees what's happening in the world as I do through eyes opened by the Holy Spirit. We basically agreed that if it were to ever in our lifetime come to the point where Christians were once again forced to go underground in our country (USA) that she and I would still trust each other and help each other hook up with the remnant that would remain via our mutual contacts. We have the makings of an entire underground church between the two of us. I don't know all her contacts and she doesn't know all mine but together, if the need ever arose, we could definitely form an underground network. I doubt seriously that it will come to -that- in our lifetime but with the rate things are moving along right now it was just something we needed to say to each other just in case.

Spring rains and a thunderstorm or two are starting up in my area. The air pressure and dampness always make me hurt and tonight is a bit rough. I'll end up lying down to read just so I can relax my aching body in the hope of not taking pain medication. I -do- love thunderstorms, however. They are untamed and exciting. I was born while one raged outside so I guess it sank into my being from birth, lol.

I've been sleeping really odd hours again and it's getting in the way of getting anything done in the house. I'm going to try to get myself back on a more normal schedule but it won't be easy. I always start having problems sleeping in the Spring. It's not for lack of being tired, I just can't seem to stay asleep for long and usually end up waking up a few times during the night and not being able to get back to sleep against for an hour or so. Then by mid-morning or so I'm wiped out and lay down for a "nap" only to find myself waking up around 5 in the afternoon. That's what happened today. So, of course, I will have issues going to sleep at a decent hour tonight and the cycle can turn vicious fast. If I don't get up until later in the day I feel too lazy (no other word for it, lol) to start getting things done in the house that require much effort beyond laundry. I work much better when during day light hours, especially if the sun is shining and it's warm (not hot). But seriously, I have to just suck it up already, rofl, and get my lazy butt moving. I should have had "spring cleaning" done already and the house needs a thorough going over desperately. I keep letting too much slide and then it starts to feel overwhelming and I get this deer-in-the-headlights reaction of just kinda standing there looking at all I need to do but feeling daunted. I used to have a better backbone than this, lol...but I'll get there again. (Speaking of rain...it just now started pouring rain outside as I was typing.)

I actually was able to talk to some people on that other news social site I wrote of last time about prayer. They were a bit hostile and came to that particular topic in order to try to bully the writer (which wasn't me). Christians take an awful beating on that site. Anyway, with God's help I was able be friendly and calm and explain the Christian perspective of prayer versus how they saw it. I'm sure I didn't sway them from turning from atheists etc but the discourse was good and civil on both sides which is rare there. I was scared to death about how to answer some of their points and questions but I just plunged in and everything just kind of materialized as I typed. I didn't think ahead of what I wanted to say because I felt inadequate to the task but it just all poured out. I actually had to read what I wrote once I was finished because, while I could see it was my verbal style, I felt honestly amazed that I'd made so much sense! LOL Obviously it wasn't me that answered these people. I just got out of the way and let God do His thing. It was weird to experience these answers coming out of me that I didn't know I had!

What have we become?

2010-05-02T18:52:00.006-04:00

Image by Dain Sandoval via Flickr

I have been spending a lot of time on another social forum. I won't name it because honestly, I don't want to encourage anyone to actually go there. It's....virulent at it's best. I stumbled on this other site quite by accident and started reading some of the issues and news items etc being discussed. I found myself....what's a good word to use here...I found myself alarmed, yes maybe that word but there was so much more too. I have spent countless hours there reading, and responding with my own points, to various things being said to try to make some kind of sense of what this hodge podge of people might signify in the larger scale of things. I was shocked to the soles of my feet by the anger, the hatred, the finger-pointing and all the other things that only served to widen this huge chasm between people. It was discouraging, frustrating, unbelievable and frightening all at the same time. Women calling the unborn "parasites". Political parties at each other's throats for the thrill of the fight and not to discuss, find common ground, learn about each other. No it was "I will win this argument". Christianity being bashed in some of the most foul ways I've ever heard in my life. People calling each other truly hateful things. I kept asking myself...does this represent the overall atmosphere in America today? Have I been so isolated within my own circle of family and friends that I just didn't notice my country and the world walking...no running...head long into so much loathing of self and others? Have I been sleeping? Or am I just so desensitized by it all now that when I see the news and read the paper it's just the same old same old but I'm no longer moved by it?

Evidence for Intelligent Design

2010-04-19T06:49:00.005-04:00

Intelligent Design Theory

http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/intelligent-design-theory.htm
OK, where am I with all this? What's this rising concept called "Intelligent Design Theory"?

Evolutionary theory declares that everything has a mere appearance of design. Richard Dawkins, author of The Blind Watchmaker and a professor at Oxford University (U.K.), is probably the leading proponent of evolutionary theory since the death of Stephen Jay Gould.

Dawkins writes:

Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose. 1
He goes on to say:

...the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design as if by a master watchmaker... 2
Nevertheless, Dawkins is an atheist who staunchly maintains that the design we see is merely an illusion -- that these amazingly complex systems are an accidental product of natural selection.

Interestingly, in all other fields of human endeavor we find that "design necessitates a designer." Thus, design detection methodology is a prerequisite for many disciplines, including archaeology, anthropology, forensics, criminal jurisprudence, copyright law, patent law, reverse engineering, crypto-analysis, random number generation, and SETI (the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence). In general, we find "specified complexity" to be a reliable indicator of the presence of intelligent design. Chance can explain complexity, but not specification. A random sequence of letters is complex, but not specified (it is meaningless). A Shakespearean sonnet is both complex and specified (it is meaningful). You can't have a Shakespearean sonnet without Shakespeare. 3

Remarkably, the SETI project, a multi-billion dollar effort to scan the cosmos for some indication of intelligence, is based on one simple notion. If we find radio waves that contain any type of ordered sequence of sounds, then we've discovered intelligence somewhere in the universe! Think about that? The whole premise of these scientists is that you can't have ordered sound (such as the blips and dashes in a Morse code transmission) without an intelligent force behind them. To me, that's huge!

Charles B. Thaxton, PhD in Chemistry and Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University, agrees:

…an intelligible communication via radio signal from some distant galaxy would be widely hailed as evidence of an intelligent source. Why then doesn't the message sequence on the DNA molecule also constitute prima facie evidence for an intelligent source? After all, DNA information is not just analogous to a message sequence such as Morse code, it is such a message sequence. 4
So, where is this going? It appears to me, if we shed our prior preconceptions and logically examine our organic world -- like we do most everything else -- we start to see things differently...

1 Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, ch. 1.
2 Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, ch. 2.
3 William A. Dembski, The Design Inference: Eliminating Chance through Small Probabilities, 1998.
4 Charles B. Thaxton, The Mystery of Life's Origin: Reassessing Current Theories, Philosophical Library, 1984.

Evidence for Intelligent Design

So, how do I connect the dots between the organic and inorganic world? Evidence for Intelligent Design is obvious upon close examination of any mechanical machine. The concept and design inherent in a machine, whether simple or complex, is self-evident. Whether a machine is high quality or low quality, its designer is both necessary and apparent. Information Theory states that concept and design can only result from a mind. Even the diminished quality of a poorly constructed machine cannot obscure the necessity of an intelligent designer.

Machines, as defined by French Biochemist and Nobel Laureate Jacques Lucien Monod (1910-1976), are "purposeful aggregates of matter that, utilizing energy, perform specific tasks." 1 By this authoritative definition, living systems are also recognized as machines. A living organism fulfills the definition of a machine all the way down to the molecular level.

Back in the mid-1700's, David Hume successfully invalidated the "machine" analogy in biologic systems because we could only guess at what existed at the molecular level. 2 However, the phenomenal discoveries in the last few decades have finally and unequivocally demonstrated that living systems are, in fact, machines - even to the deepest, molecular level! 3

It has only been over the past twenty years with the molecular biological revolution and with the advances in cybernetic and computer technology that Hume's criticism has been finally invalidated and the analogy between organisms and machines has at last become convincing… In every direction the biochemist gazes, as he journeys through the weird molecular labyrinth, he sees devices and appliances reminiscent of our own twentieth-century world of advanced technology. 4
Because of the metaphysical implications of life resulting from "Intelligent Design", a surprisingly large number of us seek to reject the foregoing statements and find a mechanism by which complex biologic machines may arise naturally by random chance.

However, I was now seeing a tremendous inconsistency...

When it comes to the origin of life there are only two possibilities: creation or spontaneous generation. There is no third way. Spontaneous generation was disproved one hundred years ago, but that leads us to only one other conclusion, that of supernatural creation. We cannot accept that on philosophical grounds; therefore, we choose to believe the impossible: that life arose spontaneously by chance! 5
H.S. Lipson, a Professor of Physics at the University of Manchester (UK), continues:

In fact, evolution became in a sense a scientific religion; almost all scientists have accepted it, and many are prepared to 'bend' their observations to fit with it.6

1 For Monod's theories see A. E. Wilder-Smith, The Natural Sciences Know Nothing of Evolution, T.W.F.T. Publishers, 1981; and Eastman and Missler, The Creator Beyond Time and Space, 43.
2 David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Fontana Library Ed., Collins, 1779.
3 Eastman and Missler, The Creator Beyond Time and Space, 79.
4 Denton, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, 340.
5 George Wald, "The Origin of Life," Scientific American, 191:48, May 1954.
6 H.S. Lipson, "A Physicist Looks at Evolution," Physics Bulletin, vol. 31, May 1980, 138.

So, I'm going to look at this "miracle of life" one more time...

Could life evolve randomly from inorganic matter? Not according to mathematicians.

In the last 30 years a number of prominent scientists have attempted to calculate the odds that a free-living, single-celled organism, such as a bacterium, might result by the chance combining of pre-existent building blocks. Harold Morowitz calculated the odds as one chance in 10^100,000,000,000. Sir Fred Hoyle calculated the odds of only the proteins of an amoebae arising by chance as one chance in 10^40,000.

...the odds calculated by Morowitz and Hoyle are staggering. The odds led Fred Hoyle to state that the probability of spontaneous generation 'is about the same as the probability that a tornado sweeping through a junk yard could assemble a Boeing 747 from the contents therein.' Mathematicians tell us that any event with an improbability greater than one chance in 10^50 is in the realm of metaphysics -- i.e. a miracle.1
Harold Marowitz, an atheist physicist, created mathematical models by imagining broths of living bacteria that were superheated until all the complex chemicals were broken down into basic building blocks. After cooling the mixtures, Marowitz used physics calculations to conclude that the odds of a single bacterium reassembling by chance is one in 10^100,000,000,000. 2 Wow! How can I grasp such a large statistic? Well, it's more likely that I would win the state lottery every week for a million years by purchasing just one ticket each week.

In response to the probabilities calculated by Marowitz, Robert Shapiro, author of Origins - A Skeptic's Guide to the Creation of Life on Earth, wrote:

The improbability involved in generating even one bacterium is so large that it reduces all considerations of time and space to nothingness. Given such odds, the time until the black holes evaporate and the space to the ends of the universe would make no difference at all. If we were to wait, we would truly be waiting for a miracle.3
Sir Fred Hoyle compared the probability of life arising by chance to lining up 10^50 (ten with fifty zeros after it) blind people, giving each one a scrambled Rubik's Cube, and finding that they all solve the cube at the same moment.

Regarding the origin of life, Francis Crick, winner of the Nobel Prize in biology for his work with the DNA molecule, stated in 1982:

An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going. 4

1 Mark Eastman, MD, Creation by Design, T.W.F.T. Publishers, 1996, 21-22.
2 Eastman and Missler, The Creator Beyond Time and Space, 76-77.
3 Robert Shapiro, Origins -- A Skeptic's Guide to the Creation of Life on Earth, 1986, 128.
4 Francis Crick, Life Itself -- Its Origin and Nature, Futura, 1982.

Creation of Life - A Final "Experiment"

Remarkably, right before I finished this chapter, a friend confronted me with "proof" for the creation of life in a "random" laboratory experiment. After a little discussion, I realized that my buddy was pointing to the "spark and soup" experiments of the 1950's where guys like Harold Urey and Stanley Miller passed mixtures of boiling water, ammonia, methane and hydrogen through elaborate "electric spark systems" of beakers and test tubes. In those experiments, they were able to produce traces of one or two amino acids -- the "building blocks of life" -- and therefore, the media hailed these as proof for the possibility of spontaneous generation on a prebiotic Earth. 1

There were many unreported problems with these "designed" experiments. Dramatically, the greatest byproducts of these soups were tar (85%) and carboxylic acids (13%), both of which are toxic to living systems. Notwithstanding all the other issues, producing a trace amino acid in a laboratory experiment would be similar to producing a clay brick and declaring that we just figured out how to randomly design and build a New York skyscraper.

After discussing a little more of the science stuff, I turned to my friend and decided to toss him a nice graphic illustration...

"Take a frog and put him in a blender. Turn the blender on for seven minutes, or until whipped to a frothy consistency."

He stared at me with that look...

"Pour the mixture into an open container and place the container in the sun for a few million years. After a few million years, retrieve the container and examine the contents..."

I gave him a nod, "Do you have a frog?"

He thought for only a second...

"Nope, you still have frog soup," he laughed.

"You're absolutely right," I agreed. "How can you have anything but a soupy mixture containing the building blocks of frog life. With no information code to tie it all together, you have nothing resembling any kind of self-existing organism."

In this simple (yet graphic) illustration, I gave every potential to create a frog. I provided every chemical, amino acid, protein and molecule that makes up the frog's organic structure. However, if I placed this illustration in the context of a "prebiotic soup" on primitive Earth, we'd be lucky to see even one trace element or amino acid develop over the same time period -- let alone the biologic components of an entire frog!

1 See, Harold C. Urey, The Planets, Their Origin and Development, Yale University Press, 1952; and Stanley Miller, Science, vol. 117, 1953, 528-529.

Philosophy of Life - Exploring My World from an Impartial View

If matter acting on matter for a sufficient period of time can create anything, then I should be able to go out to the Mountains of Colorado and find naturally-occurring computers, cameras, and cell phones. As we've seen, those inorganic devices are much less complex than a "simple" organic bacterium. Yet, most people would find my statement to be "silly" at best. Why? Whether organic or inorganic, the complexity and design is obvious.

To take this concept to a simple level, I examined the watch on my wrist (mine is digital). I contemplated the interdependent system of silicon chips, wires, and LED displays? Actually, by today's technological standards, that's a pretty simple device. However, is there any question that it was created by a group of designers, handed off to a team of mechanical engineers, and then placed into production by a team of automation specialists?

Then I took a minute to look at the wrist under my watch. I've grown comfortable with its apparent simplicity. I looked closer at the skin and hair follicles. I touched them. I thought about the nerves that just told my brain to synthesize that touch. Then I focused more closely and pondered the microscopic makeup of each of my cells. I imagined the complex cellular city at work, and contemplated the wonder of my brain that allowed me to imagine such a thing. I thought about the veins just under the surface of my skin. I thought about my heart pumping oxygenated blood through those veins to keep my wrist and hand alive. I thought about my lungs as they inflated, deflated, and processed that oxygen for my heart.

Then I flexed my hand. I pondered the miraculous communication effort that occurred in a milli-second. I created a thought -- my brain processed the subconscious instruction and translated it into a task for my body -- my nervous system delivered that task to my wrist - and my wrist performed the task perfectly. I never really thought about what just happened? How does an interconnected system like that evolve gradually and randomly over time?

It goes on and on... My digestive tract -- How did that evolve gradually over millions of years? Without processed energy, how would my earliest, evolving ancestors even exist? My part in a two-part reproductive system -- Come on, how did that evolve randomly over millions of years through natural selection and genetic mutation? How do you pass on new and improved genetic traits without the means to reproduce in the first place? I was finally thinking about these things!

So, out of all this, I developed a new thesis for my view of life... We need to drop our preconceived notions. Dump our presuppositions. Just meditate on this material with an impartial mind. Does this stuff have "metaphysical" implications? Sure. But why should that deter us from logically examining the evidence? Where did we get the notion that science and technology somehow have to exist in a naturalistic vacuum? That's not true science. True science is observing the evidence, creating a hypothesis, and testing that hypothesis through various means. Philosophical presuppositions have no place in true science. If science reveals things outside the bounds of known physics, then science should be applauded for its impartial contribution to philosophical and metaphysical thought.

I. L. Cohen is a mathematician, researcher and author -- a member of the New York Academy of Sciences and officer of the Archaeological Institute of America. In his book, Darwin was Wrong -- A Study in Probabilities, Cohen writes:

In a certain sense, the debate transcends the confrontation between evolutionists and creationists. We now have a debate within the scientific community itself; it is a confrontation between scientific objectivity and ingrained prejudice - between logic and emotion - between fact and fiction. 1

...In the final analysis, objective scientific logic has to prevail -- no matter what the final result is - no matter how many time-honored idols have to be discarded in the process. 2

...after all, it is not the duty of science to defend the theory of evolution, and stick by it to the bitter end -- no matter what illogical and unsupported conclusions it offers... if in the process of impartial scientific logic, they find that creation by outside superintelligence is the solution to our quandary, then let's cut the umbilical cord that tied us down to Darwin for such a long time. It is choking us and holding us back. 3

…every single concept advanced by the theory of evolution (and amended thereafter) is imaginary and it is not supported by the scientifically established facts of microbiology, fossils, and mathematical probability concepts. Darwin was wrong. 4

...The theory of evolution may be the worst mistake made in science. 5

1 I. L. Cohen, Darwin was Wrong - A Study in Probabilities, New Research Publications, Inc., 1984, 6-7.
2 Ibid., 8.
3 Ibid., 214-215.
4 Ibid., 209.
5 Ibid., 210.

Catholic Priests & Sexual Abuse - THE FACTS

2010-03-30T22:03:00.006-04:00

March 24, 2010, Law and Crime

Six important points you don't hear about regarding clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church
More myths than facts in Catholic clergy sexual abuse discussions

Published on March 24, 2010

There are a lot more myths than facts bantered around about clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. Here are 6 important points that you should know if you are interested in this topic.

1. Catholic clergy aren't more likely to abuse children than other clergy or men in general.

According to the best available data (which is pretty good mostly coming from a comprehensive report by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in 2004 as well as several other studies), 4% of Catholic priests in the USA sexually victimized minors during the past half century. No evidence has been published at this time that states that this number is higher than clergy from other religious traditions. The 4% figure is lower than school teachers (at 5%) during the same time frame and perhaps as much as half of the numbers of the general population of men. Research states that 17% of American women and 12% of American men were sexually violated when they were children by an adult. Sexual victimization is tragically fairly common in the general population but luckily these numbers have been dropping in recent years.

2. Clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church can't be blamed on celibacy. Not having sex doesn't make children the object of one's desire.

First, if Catholic clergy aren't more likely to be sex offenders than other clergy or men in general, then celibacy can't be blamed by itself. Most sex offenders are not celibate clergy. Most are married or partnered. Furthermore, many men who don't have sex for a variety of reasons (e.g., no suitable partners, marital or relationship distress) don't turn to children for sexual gratification. They turn to other consenting adults. Think about it: If you don't have sex who becomes the object of your desire? Children or other adults?

3. Clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church can't be blamed on homosexuality.

Although the vast majority of victims are boys (80% according to the 2004 John Jay study and other studies) and the Catholic Church has a large number of priests who are homosexual in orientation (22% to 45% according to a variety of studies and reports), homosexuality doesn't make men sex offenders. No evidence exists that suggest that sexual orientation, in and of itself, makes someone at risk to commit sex crimes against children or others. Sexual orientation is not a risk factor for crime.

4. Clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church can't be blamed on an all male clergy.

If Catholic clergy aren't more likely to be sex offenders than other clergy from other traditions, then an all male clergy can't be blamed. Having women clergy doesn't stop sex offenders from offending.

5. Almost all of clergy sexual abuse cases in the Catholic Church that we hear about in the news are from decades ago (usually the 1960's and 70's).

Although these stories are horrific to hear, they are almost never about incidents that occurred since the late 1980's. Incidents of abuse in the past 20 to 25 years are quite rare compared to incidents during the 60's and 70's. This is also true for other groups such as school teachers. Incidents since the 2002 crisis in the USA unfolded are especially rare. Most of the more recent cases are from international priests who were both born and formed (i.e., trained and ordained) overseas who generally didn't go through the screening and training process that local men go through. Some argue that more recent victims (i.e., since the mid 1980's) just haven't come forward yet. Perhaps that is true but thus far no published data supports this theory.

6. Most clergy sex offenders aren't pedophiles.

Research tells us that about 80% of clergy sex offenders abuse post pubescent teens, not pre pubescent children. So, the phrase "pedophile priest" is a misnomer. You might say that it doesn't matter. Both categories involve victimizing minors. True, but the risk factor profile as well as the evaluation and treatment prognosis is much different between the two groups. Besides, while people may be worried about young children being victimized they may neglect the more likely victim, the teen.

Perhaps the real issue here is that many are outraged with Church leaders (especially bishops) whom they believe have been defensive and arrogant. People demand responsibility and accountability and they don't see it happening. Clearly, some Church leaders treated victims and their families very poorly. For many rank-and-file Catholics who often put priests on a pedestal, it is shocking to hear that some of these men have sexually violated anyone, let alone children. The Church's unpopular positions on sexual ethics (e.g., masturbation, contraception, homosexuality, divorce) make sex crimes committed by priests even more scandalous. The secrecy and otherworldliness of the Catholic Church also make the story of child sexual abuse committed by priests of great interest to the media and to the general population.

It all sounds like a Dan Brown novel!

Finally, many of the 25% of Americans who are Catholic have ambivalent feelings about their Church to begin with even before the clergy abuse crisis unfolded. Many who were raised in the Church during previous generations have deeply emotional stories of priests and nuns who had impossibly high standards for thought and behavior which makes stories of clergy sexually violating children so hypocritical. Perhaps the gospel verse "he who is without sin may cast the first stone" from John 8:7 sums up this sentiment.

Let me be very clear...The sexual victimization of children by priests (or by anyone for that matter) is inexcusable. Church officials protecting offenders rather than victims is also inexcusable. There is much to be angry about. Many get even more upset when accountability and responsibility in the Church doesn't seem to occur.

Many reasonable and thoughtful people argue that the Catholic Church should allow married men, women, and those who are homosexual to be ordained as priests and deacons (as the Episcopals do) to prevent clergy abuse from occurring. But the current data on clergy abuse just doesn't seem to support these arguments. Perhaps future data will change current findings but you have to go with the best available data to inform one's thinking now.

The recent clergy abuse stories coming out of Europe and South America are not surprising but we have to be reasoned letting good data and logic inform us rather than relying on myths, anger, and hysteria. If someone (or some group) has empirical data that can contradict the 6 points mentioned above, please present it and let it be subjected to academic peer review. We all may have particular beliefs and perspectives about the causes, contexts, nature, and scope of clergy sexual abuse in the Church but we should be informed by empirical quality data and reason.

John Jay Study referred to earlier...can be accessed from the US Council of Catholic Bishops web site: (http://www.usccb.org/nrb/johnjaystudy/).

Everybody

2010-03-30T18:32:00.002-04:00

Check out this singer's version of "Everbody". She's great!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHEuxhrlpmY

Epic Fail Ahead!

2010-03-28T00:33:00.012-04:00

Image by Rickydavid via Flickr

This time of year is always hard for me. It's so in-between. It's not winter but truly warm either. One day it will be 50 degrees F and the next 27. Never known for my love of being cold I'm chomping at the bit for late spring and summer to get here already! I want heat! I want loooooonnnnnnnggggg summer days. I want warm, moon-lit nights where the sultry heat is kept at bay with a slight breeze. I want to hear birds, smell lilacs, newly mowed lawns, and sleep with the windows open so I can listen to the night sounds lull me to sleep. I do NOT want to hear the hum of our furnace any longer. I've entertained Jack Frost enough for the season and it's time he stopped nipping at my darned nose and went away! Okay....I'll stop ranting. For now.....

Now that our dear president managed to maneuver the hold outs to pass his so-called "health care reform" bill by way of political thuggery I sit wondering how much quicker our ruin as a country will go. It's not just this bill turned law that will do it but it sure is a major step. People think that I'm against health care reform when I say things like this but I, like many of those who voted against this bill, are all for reform of the health care system. We just know that this isn't the way it should be done. The implications are far reaching and intense and they go far beyond the "prettied up" version of helping those in need. I can't blame people for wanting to believe all the pie-in-the-sky speeches and alleged help-those-less-fortunate speeches the president made. Who wouldn't want to believe in that after all? In wanting to believe, in wanting to have some knight-in-shining-armor president to come along and magically make everything all better, many Americans desperately look past the inconsistencies.

The truth is....our country is heading for a fall...a big one. It has been heading that way more terms ago than either of the Bush administrations. Of course it's just easier to blame Bush for everything than to admit that we as a general population have brought a LOT of this economic situation on ourselves. Living on credit, buying homes we couldn't afford, not willing to settle for second best in anything whether it be type of car they drive or type of television in their home. Living on assistance but somehow still being able to afford cable television. We, as a country, are reaping what we sowed.

This is not to say that our current president isn't a crook. He is. He is deliberately (and knowingly) setting us up for a much faster fail of epic proportions. Why? Because he wants America to take part in a global economy/global currency. How better to do that than to make sure we cannot in any way survive as a people on our own any longer. He is taking steps to that end. This health care reform bill is one of several steps to to ensure that we are set up for what occurs at what is called "the end times". Lets see what he does in the middle east now, shall we? It seems to me that anyone with any understanding of the direction of the political and economical landscape of the world generally and the United States specifically, that the president is actively herding this country towards the "end time" situations spoken of in Scripture. I will be labeled a fanatic, an alarmist, a loon, and an extremist for this.....but this is my personal blog and I express my personal thoughts here.

Having said all this, let me be perfectly clear to all who may be reading: Violence is NOT the answer and I do NOT support it in any way, shape or form. Period. We need to mobilize at the voting booth, write and keep writing our congressmen/women, blog information, and most of all PRAY. Pray a lot. Pray hard. Pray with intent. Pray. Do not pray for someones ruin but pray for eyes to be opened, hearts to be changed, pray for more time for people to come to know salvation. Positive prayer for positive results ALWAYS subject to the divine will of God.

Sushi & Sushimi are GROSS

2010-03-22T18:44:00.003-04:00

Image by Kent Wang via Flickr

Okay, my husband and I decided to think outside the box and went to a Japanese restaurant for dinner. We decided to leave our food comfort zones for a change. Big mistake! I ordered and combo sushi and sushimi dish. I played it safe, or so I thought, by getting the tuna and salmon which I absolutely love. I have never....in all my years....thought food was so disgusting. I swear the fish was still wiggling on the plate it was so raw. Now, yes, I knew what I was ordering but for some reason I was not prepared for it once it was placed in front of me. But "Heck, I'm game" I thought. I tried the salmon one first. Okay...not my thing. But tuna....who can go wrong with tuna? I put it on sandwiches, in casseroles. I know what the flavor of tuna is supposed to be and I love it! I love rice too so okay...the tuna one will be great. Umm.....not so much. I'm sure that if I were starving to death and had already eaten every other thing that was possibly edible I would turn to sushi and sushimi and manage to still get it down. Well, as long as there was a lot of salt I could drown it in, LOL.

Now, I mean no disrespect at all the Japanese whatsoever. I know I dislike sushi simply because I wasn't exposed to it as a child. I was a farm girl...we ate beef, chicken and pork. And, umm...we cooked it. The only fish I'd ever eaten growing up was heavily breaded and fried. My father didn't like fish so my mother rarely made it. Fish sticks don't really count, lol.

By the way, the picture used on the blog entry is exactly what the one kind looked like. The other one was rolled up in rice and stuff and was spicy.

The next time we're going to the hibachi.

2010-03-21T02:36:00.002-04:00

Have You?

- RNM

Have you ever looked at the calendar and wondered if this is all there is for you?

Have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered where the time has gone?

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by all that is left undone?

Have you ever wondered if you were always going to feel physically and emotionally exhausted a mere hour after rising?

Has it ever felt like there isn’t enough sleep in the world to make you wake up refreshed?

Have you ever wished to have all the walls and fences torn down?

Have you ever felt caged by your circumstances?

Have you asked yourself if you even know how to be unfettered and free any more?

Has doing something as simple as washing the dishes or sweeping the floor seemed such a monumental task that it demands more energy than you possess?

Did you hate yourself for it?

Does it seem like this is the way it will always be for you?

Have you ever wished to be seen….really and truly seen….and loved anyway?

Have you ever felt the need to just cry…out loud…but never do unless you hide yourself away first?

Have you ever wished someone would rescue you…say or do just the perfect thing that opens up the world for you again?

Do you feel silly for it but go on wishing for it anyway?

Have you ever felt robbed?

Is it really so much to ask for….to want my life back?

Is it wrong to shout angrily “I've paid my dues! When is it MY turn?!”

Have you ever looked at that calendar, in that mirror, felt overwhelmed, exhausted, cheated, robbed, caged……and wanted, wished, and cried?

How True !

2010-03-19T21:19:00.003-04:00

"America is like a healthy body and its resistance is threefold: its patriotism, its morality, and its spiritual life. If we can undermine these three areas, America will collapse from within."

- Joseph Stalin

Spitting on Their Holy Vows

2010-03-19T01:23:00.007-04:00

If you're a Catholic following the latest news then you know about the letter by a coalition of nuns with a feminist agenda sent to congress in support of the president's health care reform regardless of the fact that it goes against every teaching of the Church they made holy vows to serve in complete obedience. In the letter they even lied by inflating the number of women religious they represented. Unfortunately some of these women are from my own town. I was initially shocked but then got to thinking about the slow but sure transformation of the order they are a part of to one with a very rabid feminist agenda disguised by the habit of holy orders. I am heart broken about the division they are perpetrating within women's holy orders and the Church at large. I am heart broken that this is the example they put forward to our young women who may be hearing the divine call to service within holy orders. I am heart broken that these women seem to have so easily cast aside the holy vows they took to God. These vows were made before men (or mankind) but were vows made TO God. Yet, they view them as valueless and unworthy of keeping.

It is important to know that these women are very much in the minority regardless of the inflated numbers and outright lies they issued in their statement. Below is the proof.

They Do Not Speak for Me: These Catholic Sisters say 'No' to Health Care Bill
By Deacon Keith Fournier
3/18/2010

Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

'The Bishops´ position is the authentic teaching of the Catholic Church.'

The Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious, the second conference of Major Superiors of Women Religious in the United States, believes the Bishops´ position is the authentic teaching of the Catholic Church.

WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) – As the banter back and forth continues in every news source over the proposed Health Care Legislation, the official teachers of the Catholic Church, the Bishops, have remained steadfast.

The proposed legislation - which may be pushed through without a real vote - MUST be opposed because it will expand abortions and provides federal dollars to do so.

Sadly, 60 religious sisters, claiming to speak for every member of the religious communiities the represent made National News by signing a letter to Congress urging passage of this fatally flawed Bill. The Bill undermines the fundamental Human Right to Life in its present form.

In the letter they CLAIMED they represent 59,000 nuns in taking this controversial position. However, there are only 59,000 total women living a religious life as nuns or sisters in the United States. They also supported the leader of the Catholic Health Association, Sr. Carol Keehan, who came out publicly endorsing the Bill earlier this week.

These 60 sisters have now publicly and openly contradicted the US Catholic Bishops. They went so far as to claim that this Bill is "Pro-Life" when it will expand abortions. 7 Billion dollars of federal money will be given to community health centers if the bill becomes law. That money can be used to take the lives of children in the womb.

They also maintained that the US Bishops clear concerns over the expansion of abortion were "...false claims . . . the Senate bill will not provide taxpayer funding for elective abortions." In short, they not only contradicted the Bishops, they claimed they were not giving the faithful accurate information.

Today, the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious responded. These are the leaders of thousands of sisters and nuns in the United States. They represent over 103 religious communities of women in the United States.

They take strong exception to the claims that the signatories of the letter to Congress represented Catholic women religious in the United States concerning this life or death issue. Speaking on behalf of their nuns and sisters they issued the following clear defense of the Bishops and opposition to the Legislation:

********************

March 17, 2010

In a March 15th statement, Cardinal Francis George, OMI, of Chicago, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, spoke on behalf of the United States Bishops in opposition to the Senate´s version of the health care legislation under consideration because of its expansion of abortion funding and its lack of adequate provision for conscience protection.

Recent statements from groups like Network, the Catholic Health Association and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) directly oppose the Catholic Church´s position on critical issues of health care reform.

The Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious, the second conference of Major Superiors of Women Religious in the United States, believes the Bishops´ position is the authentic teaching of the Catholic Church.

Protection of life and freedom of conscience are central to morally responsible judgment. We join the bishops in seeking ethically sound legislation.

Mother Mary Quentin Sheridan, R.S.M.
President
On behalf of the Membership of the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious

Colorado Bishops: Catholic Supporters of Health Care Bill do - ´A Grave Disservice'
By Deacon Keith Fournier
3/18/2010

Catholic Online

'Do not be fooled. Nothing has changed. The Senate bill remains gravely flawed on the issues of abortion funding, conscience protections and the inclusion of immigrants'.

DENVER, CO (Catholic Online) – What a week it has been in the fierce battle to prevent the current version of Health Care from being enacted, without a real vote, on Sunday. Without Amendment the Bill is fatally flawed. It will result in federal funds being used to take the lives of innocent children in their mother´s womb, calling such an intentional killing "health care."

The official opposition of the US Catholic Bishops to this current legislation is very clear. From among their ranks, few have articulated as clearly the reasons for such opposition as the Archbishop of Denver, Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.

In an article which appeared in the Denver Catholic Register entitled ´Catholics, Health Care and the Senate's Bad Bill´, he once again called the legislation "fatally flawed". He also strongly warned the Catholic faithful of those Catholic voices who have rejected the clear admonitions of the Bishops using these words:

"Groups, trade associations and publications describing themselves as "Catholic" or "prolife" that endorse the Senate version – whatever their intentions – are doing a serious disservice to the nation and to the Church, undermining the witness of the Catholic community; and ensuring the failure of genuine, ethical health-care reform."

As the week progressed, the use of such groups by those who want to force this legislation through without life saving amendment has intensified. It is also confusing the faithful. The letter sent to Congress by a group called ´NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby´, signed by 60 leaders of religious communities of women in the United States supporting this seriously and fatally flawed Bill is one of the worst examples.

This letter was distributed extensively by those who do not recognize the fundamental Human Right to life and want the legislation, without amendment, to become law. In this letter the signatories not only opposed the US Catholic Bishops but they accused them of misinforming the faithful. They also supported Sr. Carol Keehan, the CEO of the Catholic Hospital Association who publicly supported the legislation in a letter which was released at the beginning of the week.

The signatories of this latest letter claimed to represent 59,000 religious sisters and nuns. However, the numbers were later shown to be inflated. In fact the alternative leadership group, the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious, released their own letter. In it they stood with the US Bishops in opposing the legislation, without the absolutely necessary life saving changes.

Now, the Archbishop of Denver and his assistant Bishop, another great pro-Life champion, Bishop James D. Conley, S.T.L., have issued a formal warning to the faithful of their Diocese. We publish it below. We ask our readers to distribute it as widely as possible.

In addition, another giant of the pro-Life cause, Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City, has written an exceptionally clear article for the Diocesan newspaper The Leaven in which he articulated the reasons why this Bill must be opposed by genuinely Pro-Life Catholics and all Pro-Life people of Good will.

He opined that "The Catholic Health Association´s position, in effect, provides cover for any member of the House who chooses to buckle under the pressure of the President and the Democratic leadership to accept government funding of abortion….They can now defend themselves by pointing out that Catholic Health Care leaders recommended they vote for the bill."

Archbishop Naumann cut to the chase in commenting upon Sr. Keehan´s claim that the issue of federal funding of abortion was a "technicality". He wrote "Either the bill permits previously prohibited government funding of abortion or not. This is not a technicality…If the Senate had wanted to prohibit federal funding for abortion all they had to do was accept the language that had been adopted by the House of Representatives by an overwhelming majority." Well said.

Here is the warning issued by the Bishops of Denver:

TO THE CATHOLIC COMMUNITY OF NORTHERN COLORADO

In the past two days, congressional leaders and the White House have brought tremendous pressure on prolife Democratic members of Congress to support a fatally flawed Senate version of health care reform.

Regrettably, groups like Network and the Catholic Health Association have done a grave disservice to the American Catholic community by undermining the leadership of the nation´s Catholic bishops, sowing confusion among faithful Catholics, and misleading legislators through their support of the Senate bill.

Do not be fooled. Nothing has changed. The Senate bill remains gravely flawed on the issues of abortion funding, conscience protections and the inclusion of immigrants. Unless seriously revised to address these issues, the Senate version of health care is unethical and should be firmly opposed.

+Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.
Archbishop of Denver

+James D. Conley, S.T.L.
Auxiliary Bishop of Denver

The Common Cold - A Weapon of Mass Destruction

2010-03-18T23:47:00.006-04:00

My poor husband is coming down with cold number two already. I'm just starting to get over the first one I caught from him so I'm tempted to take a can of Lysol to him, lol. This season's colds are really stomping me. I am totally wiped out, still stuffy and sniffling...and coughing...and coughing....and, well you get the idea. I'm thinking of taking out some stock in the Kleenex company just to get some of the money back on the quantity we're going through lately.

I decided there must be something funny in all this coughing and sneezing....and I found it! Without further ado, I present to you a hysterical satirical news item:

The Onion: America’s Finest News Issue 45•29

Nation Descends Into Chaos As Throat Infection Throws Off Obama's Cadence

WASHINGTON—Looting, fires, and mass rioting swept across the nation today when a mild throat infection threw off President Barack Obama's normally reassuring and confident speech cadence, sources in every major city reported.

"My fellow [cough] Americans, please [cough] remain calm," Obama said during a nationally televised emergency address to the nation that caused the Dow Jones to plunge 50 points with every cough, sniffle, or wheeze. "Now is not the time for [cough]…everything's [cough]. Stop it."

Without the president's fluid, almost poetic tone to reassure them, the American people have abandoned all semblance of law and order and descended into a nationwide panic, burning buildings to the ground, disobeying police, and relinquishing all hope for the future.

"Run for your lives! The president no longer has a masterful yet unpretentious command of the English language!" citizens from coast to coast were heard to cry as they abandoned their jobs, homes, and families to forage in the woods for their very survival. "Without Obama's ability to turn even the most dire news into an uplifting and irresistibly quotable rhetorical gem, we'll never make it. All is lost! Nothing awaits now but utter darkness."

Riot police stanch the onslaught of angry upper-middle-class Americans in Boston.
Breaking reports now indicate that, in the absence of the president's soothing eloquence, as many as 85 percent of Americans vacated their towns to seek higher ground, or barricaded themselves in underground bunkers armed with shotguns and old presidential radio broadcasts in hopes of riding out the crisis until Obama's oratorical prowess returns.

"His reassuring but firm cadence has abandoned us!" former office manager Carol Craighead shouted through a bullhorn from the roof of her New York apartment building. "How will we weather the financial slump, escalating tensions with Iran and North Korea, war in Iraq, and our deteriorating health care system if Obama can't make the press corps chuckle with his pithy and endearing turns of phrase?"

Statements echoing Craighead's have been heard in all 50 states, as citizens grapple with the loss of the president's calming verbiage. Many say they fear that without Obama's strong, yet compassionate, vocal cadence, the entire country will crumble into dust—leaving only the ashy remains of a once powerful Western empire.

Although Obama's doctors have attempted to reassure the American public by claiming the apocalyptic throat infection should clear up in three to five days, many experts agree that any recovery will come too late.

"By that time, the damage will be done," said Harvard University's H. Robert McCallum, who was himself preparing to flee to the comparative stability of Mexico when reached by reporters for comment. "It may be decades before the stock market recovers, if it ever does, and all indications suggest that the Midwest is now an uninhabitable wasteland, abandoned by law enforcement and unwatched by God Himself."

"How could we have allowed ourselves to get to this point?" he continued. "Someone should have given him vitamin C or a lozenge or something. Some hot tea. Perhaps future historians, as they piece together the ruins of our civilization, will be able to figure out how such a vile fate could have been avoided."

What personnel remain at the Department of Defense estimated this afternoon that only 15 percent of the U.S. military remains under federal control. The rest are reportedly roaming the countryside in armed bands, looting and pillaging as they go. Those senior officers still reporting for duty have barricaded themselves inside the Pentagon, where they have gradually succumbed to infighting as the chain of command grows more and more ambiguous.

"How are we to find hope without Obama's liquid tenor to distract us?" ousted defense secretary Robert Gates asked. "I can't go back to the way it was two years ago. I'd rather die."

As the crisis worsens, attempts to replace Obama's soothing eloquence with an equally authoritative and reassuring vocal presence continue. Actor Morgan Freeman, celebrated for his voice-over narrations in films like March Of The Penguins, put forth a heroic effort, but was unable to quell the unprecedented civil unrest. Dennis Haysbert, star of Fox's 24, was also slated to make a speech, but is now missing and presumed dead.

White House officials have admitted that their early attempt to temporarily placate the nation with a primetime address by Vice President Joe Biden was a disastrous lapse in judgment, after Biden's numerous gaffes resulted in the dissolution of the Senate and the destruction of the Washington Monument.

St Paddy's Day!

2010-03-17T20:15:00.002-04:00

Well....even though I actually descend from Irish ancestors on my father's side, I didn't do a thing for St Patrick's Day today. I didn't wear green. Although, if you're Catholic you would actually wear the color orange not green. I didn't drink green beer, eat corned beef and cabbage or any of the other things associated with this particular holiday. This day lost its spiritual meaning long ago and has been replaced by the notion that it exists for the sole purpose of getting as drunk as possible then getting behind the wheel of your car and driving home. Call me a stick in the mud if you must but I just can't bring myself to participate in the mockery that it has become. I can pretty much bet that the Saint for whom it is named and celebrated wouldn't exactly be thrilled either at the change from a spiritual celebration to one of unchecked hedonism.

Some of the more actual down home traditions....special foods, prayers, etc are much more accurate and I fully support those. I -am- of Irish (amongst others) decent after all.

Prayer Request - RED ALERT!

2010-03-16T10:27:00.002-04:00

Image via Wikipedia

I don't usually do this but this is an exception. Someone very very dear to me is going through a very difficult time right now. Due to the respect I have for this persons privacy I cannot or will not go into details. Details aren't really necessary since we all know that the Holy Spirit already knows anyway. If you would lift this person up to the Lord in supportive prayer and continue to do so for the next few weeks I would be very grateful. This person needs to continue to be open to the breaking God is doing in his/her life right now. Pray that they continue to be open emotionally to the new work God is doing in them even though it is VERY painful. Pray that they heal and come not only to a closer love and relationship with God but with family and friends. Pray the emotional peace that comes through understanding and overcoming some very harsh experiences in their life that have impacted who they are now. Pray for their strength as they go through this process because it is painful and they may be tempted to quit and rebuild the walls that God just tore down. Pray for this person not to over-think or over-logic things back into nicely labeled boxes because doing so is a well used defense mechanism for them. Pray that they still be able to feel and accept the love and support not only of God but of those of us that are closest to them.

As I said this person is very dear to me and if you would pass this prayer request on to as many prayer warriors as you know so that we could all be of one accord and one mind for this person's well being, a closer embracing of God and, through God's guidance and intervention, the ability to become the person they truly wish to be, to experience the freedom that healing can bring, I would be very grateful.

Thanks guys.

Spring = A Cold and Sore Throat

2010-03-14T01:43:00.006-05:00

Image by the urban mermaid via Flickr

Yep...it's springtime!!! I have the stuffy nose and sore throat to prove it. My husband is just getting over his seasonal sickness and I thought I had escaped since I refused to kiss him for the duration, LOL. Poor guy. But....no such luck. What started as a big allergy flair up has now morphed into a cold. I blame my husband....who blames his boss. So, I guess I blame his boss too...just to be fair.

Our 11th wedding anniversary is just around the corner. We were married on March 20th 1999, on the first day of spring. It rained. It was cold. But it was the bestest day ever! When I think of the fact that it's been 11 years I find myself stunned. Has it really been that many? It doesn't seem like it. Did I accidentally sleep through a couple years here and there? Eleven years....eleven loooonnnng grueling years.....(I say that only because he will be reading this blog and I want to pick on him, lol). Seriously though, it went so darned fast! Let's just slow things down a bit for crying out loud. It's like eating a five star meal so fast you barely got to really taste it. I want to savor my time with him....slowly. I want it to last a while. The good, the bad...the ugly...it's all okay as long as it's at his side.

We turn our clocks ahead one hour tonight for daylight savings time. DST was started in WWI and WWII to conserve fuel required for lighting etc during the war. I think the government hasn't been told that WWI and II are over now. I am of the opinion that the whole turning the clocks forward and back is a load of hoo-haw now days. It serves no purpose than to drive us nuts not just once but TWICE a year. Even worse is that not all areas observe DST so it just makes it even more of a pain in the....hind quarters. I keep waiting for the day when someone in Washington has a light bulb moment and does away with the whole thing finally. Of course waiting for someone in Washington...anyone...to have a light bulb moment about anything is a gamble.

Life After World of Warcraft and Back to the "Crack"

2010-03-10T16:14:00.006-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

My husband and I canceled our monthly account to the game World of Warcraft several months ago now. We both thought we'd go through some kind of withdrawal from the game since we played it for a few years. We are both amazed that we don't miss it....not at all. WoW is a great game and lots of fun but once you've played it long enough to have gotten to end game content on several characters you find yourself faced with the tedium of having only a few things left to do. You raid...that's it. Not only that but you have basically one or two areas that you raid.....all the time....every week...ad nauseum. To do that you have to be a part of a raiding guild and pray real hard that you are decked out in all the best gear and have all the best everything so you will be picked to join the group doing the raid. BLEH. Every week it's the same...raid...rinse, repeat.

We also don't miss all the "politics" that became such a big part of guild life. In a game where social interaction is at least half the fun of playing, the guild we had loved once turned from a "social" guild to a "raid only" guild. That's not a bad thing in and of itself but raid guild are a dime a dozen since just about everyone who plays WoW now has played it for years and are in the same position of having nothing left to do BUT raid. The guild we had been in for years dumped everything that drew us to it to begin with and a lot of the typical politics that come with being a raid guild began to undermine all its easy going social aspects until all that was left was a core "in" group surrounded by a lot of people who were jumping through hoops trying to find their way inside the inner circle. Tons of heavy handed rules, regulations, and so on killed the fun and totally butchered what was once a fun light-hearted atmosphere where lots of friendly banter normally took place.

By the time my husband and I got to the point where we threw up our hands and left the game there was nothing left of it that we would miss. We do miss being able to play a game with each other. MMORPG's like WoW and EverQuest II offer an environment where members of a family can play together. By the time we left our guild and WoW altogether it had gotten to the point where leadership actually chastised me for asking him to play his higher level character with my lower level one to help me through a particularly hard quest. That was the final straw and the death knell of the guild and the game for us. But...we love gaming. We play several single player games like those I mentioned on earlier posts but we still can't be inside the game together and play as a team.

I recently went back to playing EverQuest II (it's called "EverCrack" by many game devotees due to the games ability to suck you into it...hence the expression in this blog title) and it appears that my husband will be doing the same soon. We never really played very far into that game so even though its been around for years it will be a relatively new experience for us. It would be nice to be able to play the game together...just to play....no agenda, no guild politics and pressures...just good old fashioned fun. I'll have to wait and see how long it takes before he breaks down and starts playing EverQuest II with me. I give it a week tops. I doubt it will take that long but ya never know. He isn't big on making decisions quickly. Drives me nuts in the cereal isle at the grocery store, LOL.

Grocery Shopping While Hungry

2010-03-06T01:31:00.003-05:00

Image by TheAlieness GiselaGiardino²³ via Flickr

Big mistake! I broke a cardinal rule. I went grocery shopping before dinner while I was hungry. Le sigh. You don't even want to know how much junk and garbage food I bought. That goal of 10 pounds by June is not looking so good. I'm actually not against someone who is trying to lose weight eating a bit of junk or snacks etc. It's all about portion control. I've always thought that the total denial diet only set a person up to fail. Unfortunately for me...portion control is a huge issue. Plus portion control doesn't work when a person eats small portions of a LOT of different junk foods, rofl. Kinda defeats the whole idea. I find my craving for things like sweets goes up significantly when my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome kicks in and/or I've been suffering form migraines for long periods. I'm going through both right now and have been for a couple weeks now. The sweets trigger chemicals in the brain in the effort to add instant energy and pleasure centers. It's my brains way of trying to counter balance the situation but it certainly doesn't help the weight issue. The added pounds around the hips and thighs protects my bones which can break easily do to being decalcified, a common problem for paraplegics. But seriously, too much means I have a lot harder time lifting myself in and out of the car, the bathtub, etc. I am really noticing that issue now. My arms can only do so much for pity's sake and I'm really making it hard on them. I have to keep reminding myself that simply because the food is in the house doesn't mean I have to eat it all in two sittings.

This constant battle with migraines along with the other pain issues I have always makes me wonder about the benefit of suffering. Mother Teresa referred to it as "the gift of suffering" as have many other Saints throughout history but I STILL can't wrap my head around that idea. I do NOT accept my suffering graciously. I hate it! I struggle to make it go away. I don't suffer all this with a serene smile and I'm normally not able to just shrug and say it's all just fin and dandy. It's PAIN! It HURTS! It's CONSTANT! After days and days of it I want to tear my hair out by the roots and throw a spiritual hissy fit. Heck, I want to throw a physical one too for that matter. I find myself glaring up at God with a belly full of indignation and asking "Haven't I paid my dues, for crying out loud?!" I know that doesn't make me a very spiritually together person but it sure does make me human. Constant pain wears a person down physically and emotionally. People who don't face it will offer up "explanations" of how it empties us to be filled with the grace of God and other such rubbish. I say rubbish because when a person is worn down by constant pain, they do want to hear a bunch of oh-so-spiritual platitudes. They aren't open to it and it comes off really snarky. I know I'm not being very nice but seriously, it's what people in my position often think and are too polite to say so I might as well just lay it out there and be honest.

At this point you most likely think I'm having a crisis of Faith. Not so. I love my Father. I know with my mind that whatever is happening to me personally and the world at large does not go beyond His knowledge and allowances. I am secure enough in my relationship with my Father to not hid my true feelings...my frustration, anger, questions and so on. We humans are finite and the forever things of God are way way WAY beyond our understanding. That being said, I think it's natural for us to look up at Him at various times and wonder "What the heck is going on?!" Right now that's where I am....I'm worn out and worn down from constant exhaustion and migraines. I look up at God and ask "What the heck?!!" It doesn't mean I love Him less or that my Faith in Him is less. It means that I'm a finite human being crying out to He who is infinite like a small child cries out to her daddy when the situation she's in seems just a bit too big to handle.

Must.....Tickle....Kitty!!!

2010-03-04T23:38:00.002-05:00

Mid-winter Blahs

2010-03-04T21:47:00.002-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

I've been very lazy about blogging this winter. Beyond the month that my husband was off from work for gall bladder surgery, it's not like I haven't had plenty of time. I'm house bound without a car and more so in the winter as I'm not allowed to go out in the cold much so one would think I'd be writing up a storm. I find I've fallen victim to the mid-winter blahs. I get them every year around in late February and March after short days with over cast skies and very little bright sunshine and long nights of deep darkness. I go into hibernation mode. My chronic fatigue syndrome will kick in and sleeping 15 hours a day is not unusual. Energy levels are at an all time low this time of year and I find it takes more effort than I have to keep up with the everyday tasks of housework much less maintaining a blog. But I'm not giving up on it so just hang in there with me folks!

Spring is just around the corner and I find myself anxious for it to just get here already! Winter has actually been fairly mild this year. Just a few heavy snows followed by mild days which melt a lot of it again. Be that as it may, I am a summer person. I have to have long warm sun-filled days. I have to have birds singing, blue skies, summer rainstorms. I have to have flowers, green grass, leafy trees and all the other wonderful things that come with summer. Even the high humidity and heat doesn't bother me too much. A small window air conditioning unity in the bedroom makes sleeping easy. I much rather have open windows than air conditioning anyway. I'm trying not to watch the calendar but it's getting harder now that it's March.

My goal of losing 10 pounds by June in floundering badly. It's my fault entirely. Sleeping a lot and eating more than I should is a bad combination. I have time yet to reach my goal but it won't happen until I manage to get a grip on my will power. That muscle is pretty weak, lol.

This past two weeks has been a long fight with migraines. I had it really REALLY bad for about three days but now they are down to a more normal pain level. I get one, take medication, it goes away after a few hours and then comes right back again the next day and the cycle starts all over. Spring and Autumn are my worst times of the years for them because of the air pressure so I'll be bombarded with them in April and May. Such is life....one plays the hand that's dealt them.

I'm going to try to be a lot more reliable in keeping up with this blog than I have been and in reading my fav's listed on the side panel. Sometimes the days speed by and before you know it a month has gone by and I'm left wondering where ti went and how I missed it!

Mass Effect 2 Game

2010-02-18T15:54:00.005-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

This month is speeding by so fast! I blink and several days go by...and no blog posts! EeeeK! I guess I should be glad there isn't too much happening around here. Sometimes no news is good news.

I've been playing yet another single player computer (or console) game called Mass Effect. The first in the series came out a couple years ago and the second one just came out a few weeks ago. It's a science fiction RPG (role playing game) based in space. There are all kinds of aliens and planets and bopping around the galaxy fighting to save it from life as we know it from total destruction by hyper advanced sentient machines. I'm not usually a huge sci-fi fan for the most part but I'm really enjoying this game a lot.

This game, like Dragon Age (mentioned in my last post) is put out by BioWare. Also like Dragon Age is has a lot of interaction between your character and the others he/she teams up with to save the galaxy. It's a gritty game not intended for younger players in my opinion.

The second game ME2 is grittier than the first. There is some seriously strong language that, while realistic, isn't absolutely necessary in the advancement of the game. I can look past that but I wouldn't be thrilled having a minor playing the game. Also like Dragon Age there is the possibility for some adult romantic interaction but I've seen much much worse on daily soap operas and night time television than in the game. Also, the interaction does not have to take place and is not forced upon the player so the freedom to play the game without that is entirely possible. The game is intensely story driven and is not just a shooter with the bare minimum of plot thrown in. The history of your character can continue from the first game in the series so there is that feeling of a saga much as one got when watching all the Star Wars movies. Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 are two of what will be a trilogy so there is one more in development.

As with Dragon Age, your character is faced with numerous choices in actions and dialogue that not only effect them but may or may not have long reaching effects on the world around them and the lives of others. Choices exist to show mercy or to be more hard nosed and then further along in the saga and life of your character you find out how those choices effected the person to whom they were done and to others with whom that person came into contact. Sometimes the decisions come back to bite you in the butt and other times you see where you've impacted and changed the life of the person for the good and in so doing have positively impacted the lives of all those that person touches. Truly a great lesson in how our actions, no matter how small they may seem to us at the time, can effect so much more than we imagine. Even with the use of some not-so-great language at times, I find the game to be just as much about morality, having personal standards and values as it is about the more obvious plot of saving the galaxy. I give this series of games a huge thumbs up and recommend it to any adult gamer. I do recommend using your head phones if you have children in the home and I sure wouldn't allow a minor to play it as they aren't "fully cooked" yet in the establishment of personal boundaries and values.

I am really enjoying this game a lot. Another game by BioWare that sucks me in like reading a really great book. I find myself caring about the characters in the game and in the unfolding story as well as enjoying the action.

Back to Normal & Dragon Age Game

2010-02-05T21:46:00.003-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

My husband will be returning to work in one week. He's basically back to normal but just needs to get the release from the doctor and get his sleep cycle back to normal again so he's safe to drive. It's been so nice having him home. It'll be hard for both of us when he goes back to working ten hours a day six days a week. Of course the brighter side is that I might be more inclined to do actual house work once things return to a more normal routine. We've both did as little as possible and it shows, LOL. His parents are coming up for a visit on Sunday so we'll be doing some last minute cleaning on Saturday but nothing nearly as thorough as needs be done.

Working on the eating habits has been touch and go. I fail more than I succeed but I'm still hanging in there. I'm hoping to lose ten pounds at least by June. That may not seem like a lot to most of you but it's really hard to do when I can't really exercise and my calorie intake would have to be so low to lose the weight that I would have nutrition issues. So I expect it will be a long and slow process. Even ten pounds would make a big difference. It's not water weight like it is for most people so even getting that initial five pounds off which is usually so easy for everyone is going to be difficult. I've decided not to deprive myself of any particular foods but to limit the portion sizes I consume instead. I know myself too well and I know I'll break down and binge if I try to not allow myself to eat some of the "garbage" foods I love...like pizza. But now, instead of eating four pieces I would eat two, for example. When we pick something up from some place like McDonalds I will order a happy meal rather than a full sized adults meal. Or I'll get their salads...which I find are actually pretty good and satisfying. I have to admit to breaking down and getting a full sized adults meal once or twice but I found that it was almost too much food to finish. I'll take that as a good sign that I may be succeeding in shrinking my stomach so I'm less prone to eating large amounts. I have a long painful road ahead of meal to meet my goal of ten pounds by June but I'm trying to focus on one day at a time...one decision at a time.

I've been playing a new computer game called Dragon Age - Origins. It's a bit controversial in some religious circles as it has the potential to deal with adult situations and themes if the player choses to play them out but I am a 47 year old woman not some teenager. The game is rated for adult players age 18 and up so it's really the place of the parents to decide if they will allow their minor child to play the game or not. But for myself and my husband, we are really enjoying it. It's all swords, dragons, good vs evil etc. but engages the player so well it's like getting into the story of a really good book. The player becomes attached to not only the character they create to play as but also their fellow adventurers. The entire game gives the player diverse situations where their choices effect not only themselves but others to a lesser or greater degree. It's actually an excellent tool for showing people how even their smallest choices can have long reaching effects on more people than just themselves. It shows how a harsh word, a too-fast judgment and so on can expand beyond what they imagine. While some Christian organizations have focused on some of the more adult themes and interactions that can (but don't have to) occur in the game, I find myself seeing all the positive lessons it teaches the player. One of the characters in the game acts as a sort of "moral compass" and even talks about what true leadership is, the abuse of influence and power, and about how a persons every action can act as a ripple in a still pond effecting everything in the pond and how we should consider this before we act in a certain manner. Truly, I find the positives far outweigh the negatives. The game is also just fun. Plain and simple. It's action packed, intense, story driven and the outcome can change depending on the choices made by the player throughout the game. The game play itself changes based on the race or gender of the main player's character which goes a long way in demonstrating how prejudice or preference effects how people act towards others. If you're an adult who enjoys a good fantasy roll-playing game and have a computer or console I highly recommend this game. If you are easily offend by the potential for some adult based romances etc then this game is not necessarily for you as those choices can and do present themselves. You don't have to play those out and can keep everyone at "friend only" but if the fact that this exists in the game will bother you then this game is not for you.

Three Weeks More

2010-01-26T13:16:00.002-05:00

My husband got the drainage tube taken out of his abdomen today. He said it hurt a lot getting it pulled out but he is finally drain free and can stop having to mess with it. The doctor is giving him another three wonderful weeks off from work. Of course he's feeling weirded out about it. He doesn't know how to deal with having to take it easy and I think he's got this notion in his head that he MUST return to work ASAP. Pffftt. He's still in too much pain for that and too much activity right now makes the pain rear its head.

Personally, I'm glad to have him home for a while. I'm sure we'll both be climbing the walls after three weeks of constant togetherness, LOL, but I'm going to enjoy having him home.

Pictures don't lie...unfortunately

2010-01-24T14:16:00.005-05:00

I find it....what's the word I'm searching for here....disconcerting....yeah, that's a good word....how I can look in the mirror and see one image of myself and then see recent photos and my jaw drops open and I exclaim "Is that what I really look like?!" Yep, the worst has happened...the camera did NOT lie like my mirror seemed to be doing for quite some time. Well, my mirror wasn't exactly lying...it was just bending the truth a bit is all. I suppose I should explain.

For the last five years or so I look in the mirror and see a woman who is aging a bit. I can handle that..no big deal. I see a woman who has gain a few pounds. There is some gray in the hair. Nothing too drastic all in all, I think. Then the photos. Yep...the ugly truth hits me smack dab in the face! Those few pounds I thought I gained turned into several. The hair went from it's youthful luster it used to have to a semi-drab brown. The grays are still there, of course but they still don't really bother me all that much. But the weight gain was a LOT more than I'd thought and the limp drab hair has just GOT to go. I mean seriously....when did all this happen?! Now you may be shaking your head and saying that I'm being a tad vain. Yes...yes I am. LOL. I AM a woman after all and I used to be fairly cute not so long ago. I could swear I saw my mother looking back at me in those photos. No no no...this just can NOT be happening to me!

Okay okay...I'm done having a hissy fit...well almost done. Nothing like a good dose of reality to make one see that it's way WAY past time to get oneself together. The weight loss is a battle I have been struggling with off and on for the past couple of years. Of course I don't put up that hard of a fight because...and I'll be honest here...I LOVE food! It's wonderful! But the weight gain not only isn't healthy for my generally but makes other things in life much more difficult to manage due to my paraplegia and fibromyalgia. A good twenty pound weight loss would make a world of difference and it's not going to ever happen the way I'm going about it now. It's my biggest addiction. I was told by a doctor that the imbalance I have in my brain of serotonin drives my issues with food and weight. I still think a large dose of good old fashioned will power is a bigger factor than anything else. I can't exercise off the calories so that makes it very hard but I can curb my intake. This will be a huge challenge...one I've not done well with so far.

The hair is an easy fix actually. A visit to a salon for a cut and perm...maybe a color too...and whoa-la! I guess with all the things happening over the past few years with my mother becoming terminally ill and my own health issues I've let a lot of things slide that I normally would not have otherwise. I guess seeing those awful photos was a blessing in disguise. Hopefully they'll give me some motivation that I lacked before. I can't do anything about the dark circles under my eyes....a nice hereditary gift from my mom's side of the family...and I really dislike cosmetics...but the other things are changeable. Let's hope I can succeed finally. I really didn't like what I saw at all.

I'm Baaa-aaack! and Husband's Gall Bladder Surgery

2010-01-23T07:51:00.003-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

Okay, so it's been....well...a looong holiday break. I'm back ready to type your ears off again.

My husband had his gall bladder surgery and everything went well. The doctor said it was one of the worst gall bladders he's seen. The surgery took a bit longer than normal but everything worked out well. He's home now and recovering pretty well. They left a drain inside to get rid of excess fluids and we're hoping it will be taken out this coming Tuesday. The drainage has to be down to a certain amount per 24 hours before the drain can come out, however. So far it's at twice that amount so unless it slows down a lot over the next few days the doctor may decide to leave it in for a while longer. I doubt he'll be returning to work next week either ways as there is still the issue with pain. He's not lifting anything very heavy yet and starts hurting again after walking around or bending over at all. He's allowed to do those things unless it hurts. It's nice having him home but I know he's starting to go batty from being bored. Sitting up at the computer to play games etc lasts for only a very short time as his position causes him to start hurting again. There are only so many movies one can watch before you want to pull your hair out from the tedium.

I'm doing my best to do all the more physical things he used to do and it's getting tough. My fibromyalgia is kicking in big time so I'm having some pretty aggressive pain issues of my own. I was doing really well at hiding it from him until the other night when he caught me wincing and noticed that I was letting out deep breaths...a sign that I'm in pain. I fessed up but felt horrid for letting it show. I don't want him feeling guilty as he has no reason to nor do I want him trying to do things he's not ready for yet. He hasn't tried to push it so I'm relieved about that as least.

Our holidays were nice. We hibernated in our home rather than traveling all over. The weather played a small part in that decision but it was nice to be able to just snuggle down together with no agenda and no time tables. We never go out for New Years celebrations. We prefer to not be on the roads where all the drunks are driving and neither of us are big on the party scene. That may sound pretty boring to most people but we were content to just be home together.

I hope everyone's holiday was wonderful and blessed. I'll write more regularly again now and will be reading all my favorite blogs.

I'm still here, LOL

2009-12-14T15:38:00.002-05:00

I know I haven't blogged in quite a few days but wanted to assure you all that I'm still alive and well. I'll be back and at it again after the New Year begins. So please check back around January 1st or 2nd and more than likely I'll be talking your ears off again.

I hope everyone's holiday season is blessed and safe.

Catholic leaders & believers....where is the Church Militant?

2009-12-01T03:14:00.020-05:00

I've noticed that during the hoopla between Congressman Kennedy and Bishop Tobin, few if any other Bishops in the United States have stepped up to offer their public support. I came across the following article that sums up the shrinking nerve of many of our Catholic leaders to step out boldly in support of even basic Catholic teachings. It's one thing to preach to those inside the church building but I personally would like to see more Bishops like Bishop Tobin standing up and proclaiming the truth without fear even if the person they are facing down at the moment is someone with political clout or celebrity. Take a moment to read this article from http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/articles.cfm?id=407

Why Patrick Kennedy attacked his bishop
by Phil Lawler, November 24, 2009

Why did Patrick Kennedy pick a fight with his bishop?

Because that is what happened, you know. Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence has refused to back down, but it was the Democratic congressman from Rhode Island who took the first rhetorical shot—and then twice loosed a new salvo just as things were beginning to calm down.

Well, why does any politician usually release a public statement? To gain a political advantage.

Rep. Kennedy is a partisan Democrat, locked in a tense struggle over a major piece of legislation. Moreover, he is the son of another legislator, the late Senator Ted Kennedy, for whom this issue—health-care reform—was a lifelong goal. So Rep. Kennedy is fighting not only for his party's goal but also for his father's legislative legacy. The Catholic bishops have become involved in the public debate on this issue, and their involvement endangers the passage of the bill Kennedy backs. So Congressman Kennedy has done his best to soften up the opposition by putting the Catholic hierarchy on the defensive.

Virtually alone among the thousands of journalists who have commented on the Kennedy-Tobin dispute, the perceptive John Allen of the National Catholic Reporter saw things clearly. After acknowledging the possibility that Kennedy's most recent outburst was an unrehearsed answer to a reporter's question, Allen continued:

On the other hand, Kennedy has a deep reservoir of political savvy swimming in his gene pool, and it’s impossible not to notice that there are at least two clear political objectives to be served by revealing Tobin’s disciplinary act now:
• It’s reminder that the bishops don’t speak for a unified Catholic bloc when it comes to abortion policy. The political translation is that a legislator doesn’t have to worry about losing all 67 million Catholic votes in America if they don’t back the bishops’ line.?
• It creates a PR headache for the bishops, because it shifts the terms of debate from the merits of the pro-life argument to the bishops’ tactics in suppressing dissent.

Exactly. Patrick Kennedy knows—indeed his family's political history testifies—that for the space of an entire generation, Catholic bishops have been reluctant to exert any discipline on Catholic politicians. As a result most Catholic politicians—and most Catholic voters—no longer believe that Church teachings should have any influence on their political choices.

Patrick Kennedy knows, too, that the stand taken by Bishop Tobin is unpopular. Liberal journalists can be counted upon to attack a Catholic bishop who takes such as stand—as television commentator Chris Matthews attacked Bishop Tobin. Public opinion polls can be taken to reinforce the well-documented fact that most self-identified Catholics disagree with their bishops. Still more important, Kennedy knows that even the American episcopate is not united on this question; most of America's Catholic bishops will not rally to the Bishop Tobin's defense. And sure enough, since this very public dispute began a month ago, very few other bishops have bothered to voice even tepid support for their embattled brother in Providence.

This silence of the American hierarchy, which has continued for so many years, has had devastating effects on the public influence of the Catholic Church. A generation ago, Catholic politicians respected and feared the bishops, and avoided even a hint of public conflict with their Church. Not so today. After years of backpedaling, trying to avoid conflict, the bishops find that politicians are attacking them.

Nowhere is this more evident than in Massachusetts, where Patrick Kennedy was raised. This week the four Democratic candidates who are competing for the seat vacated by the death of Patrick's father met for a televised debate. The most noteworthy aspect of that debate as evidenced by the headline coverage in the Boston Globe-- was the fierce competition among the candidates to be most strident in criticizing Bishop Tobin in particular, and the Catholic Church in general. Three of the four Democratic candidates proudly proclaim themselves as Catholics. (The fourth, who boasts of his Italian immigrant ancestry, identifies himself as Episcopalian.) Yet all four unambiguously denounced the Catholic Church's stand on abortion, homosexuality, and embryo research. One of the Catholic contenders, Congressman Michael Capuano, went on to say that the Church is also wrong to bar women from priestly ministry, and vowed that if a bishop told him not to receive Communion he would defy that order.

Congressman Patrick Kennedy made a shrewd political calculation. He thought that by attacking Bishop Tobin—that is, by attacking his own Church, his own faith—he could help recapture the Democratic momentum toward successful passage of the health-care reform bill. Thus far his strategy seems to be working.

What would it take to turn the tide—to ensure that an attack on the Catholic Church is not a successful political gambit? That question is easy to answer: It would take solidarity among Catholics.

We lay Catholics need to make it clear—to our friends and neighbors, to our political representatives, to our local newspapers, and (if the occasion arises) to pollsters—that we support Bishop Tobin's stand. More important, we need to encourage our own bishops to join Bishop Tobin in an unapologetic public defense of Catholic teaching.

For my part, I will simply say that on this Thanksgiving Day I plan to whisper a prayer of gratitude for the witness of this brave bishop in Providence, who has finally done what American Catholic bishops should have been doing—but haven't—for the past 35 years.

One of the things I'm thankful for.......KITTIES!

2009-12-01T01:36:00.001-05:00

Speaking the truth boldy - Paul Washer sermon

2009-11-29T04:06:00.002-05:00

Listen to this when you have some time to sit and pay attention. This sermon is over an hour long but is well worth the listen.

Really Important Information about the NIV version of the Bible.

2009-11-28T14:00:00.001-05:00

The Beginning of the End

2009-11-28T04:24:00.002-05:00

The one town mentioned is Edinboro, Pennsylvania. This is where I attended university. The college there is rife with anti-Christian teaching via many professors who use their classrooms to promote Christian bashing and atheist ideas. Christians who take some of the classes where these professors teach find out very quickly that if they have any hope of passing that class and not ruining their grade point average, they'd better keep their Christian yaps shut. If they don't, not only is it terribly hard to get anything over a D or maybe a C grade in that particular professor's class, they are always held up to ridicule and sarcastic harassment by the professor in front of the entire class. Violence, drugs, rape, occult practices, etc run rampant on the campus. When I attended Edinboro University of Pennsylvania back in the early to mid 1980's there was a ministry run on campus by "Youth for Christ" and it was the only recourse Christian students had to meet and fellowship with like minded individuals regardless of denomination. I'm unsure if the program still exists. I started out my college life deeply involved in the occult. I graduated a committed Christian in no small part due to the influence of a few students who just lived the example of Christ in front of me.

Why?!

2009-11-28T01:49:00.003-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

I am currently going through a huge grappling session with God. I'm not losing my Faith or anything. I'm not mad at God. I'm just kind of freaking out over these really tough questions. Right now I'm focused on one question in particular.

Why do some people become believers while others don't?

I've been hounding God about this one. I keep asking why am I a believer and others aren't? What happened to me that caused me that brought me to Faith in Christ that isn't happening to those who don't believe or even believe but hate God? Why isn't this thing happening for them so they too can believe and come to the saving knowledge of Christ? I know there are the obvious answers of Satan keeping the blinders on people so they are less likely to be open to salvation and similar "reasons" but that doesn't dig deep enough for me. It doesn't dig deep enough because I had those same blinders and yet I managed to find and accept salvation...why not the other people out there? I've had bad things, horrible tings happen to me just like a lot of other people that use that as a reason for not believing....and yet I believe. So where is the line drawn...where or what is the thing that made the difference for me and not for them? If it's all based on the Holy Spirit then why wouldn't He open the hearts and eyes of everyone? I can't wrap my head around the notion that God only calls a certain few to Him and deliberately doesn't call or make Himself known to others. I've heard that said in regards to the "many are called but few are chosen" thing and I just don't think that's an accurate interpretation of that line.

I've been reading the posts of a large group of atheists and anti-Christians on a forum just to get a sense of what they think, why they think it and so on. They all want scientific proof for everything and many of them are very very anti-Christian in that whenever a Christian posts on the forum to try to answer some of the things they ask or say...they go into what I consider a feeding frenzy of Christ hate, Bible hate, etc. Of course trying to "debate" with them is impossible because Christians are coming from one diametrically opposed view and stand point than are they. Some of the thing they say and the attitudes I see are absolutely painful to me. I almost feel a physical pain. I can't point to a part of my body and say "this is where I hurt when I read the posts on this forum" but I feel a kind of literal pain that just permeates me. It drains me physically and emotionally sometimes to the point where I actually have to go lay down for a while because I feel physically exhausted or overwhelmed to the point of feeling ill. Not sick to my stomach ill but a kind of overall physical feeling of "blah-ness" like one has just as they start coming down with the flu or just after they start recovering from it.

I've not posted on that forum or tried to answer any of the issues they ask about because I know I'm not equipped to do so. That in itself makes me feel sad because I keep thinking I should be able to give an answer to these unbelievers "in and out of season" as spoken of in Scripture. Again however, I've seen people who are obviously Spirit filled followers of of Christ who are also well educated in Biblical theology give answer on that forum who are torn to pieces by sarcasm, contempt and a twisting of every little thing they say in order to make them appear foolish or stupid. Then my throat starts to close up in a lump and tears start to form in my eyes and I want to weep for real and be the one that can swoop in there and say just the right thing to make a difference or open their eyes to the precious gift I have in Christ. I know there is no perfect thing I can say but I still wish I could.

All that brings me right back to the original issue....WHY?!!!! What is it that happens that opens the hearts and eyes of a non-believer so that they desire the gift of salvation and turn to God's mercy?! Why me and not them?!! The human side of me sees this as terribly unfair...unfair that I should be given this remarkable gift of grace and mercy from God to the extent that my very soul is redeemed all the while I see these people and others who don't have it and don't want it! I even stumbled across a former Catholic priest on those forums denouncing his faith happily!!!!! I got a little pang of literal physical stomach queasiness when I read what he wrote. The tummy upset passed but a migraine set in so fast that it was frightening! A for real no-holds-barred migraine! I got one the last time I read from that forum too because I get so emotionally wrapped up in the sorrow of it. I am also reading some of the things fellow believers write in response ans there is a couple of them that I am upholding in prayer along with the unbelievers that they may somehow some way be saved before it's too late. The former priest was 74 years old when he first posted so I was especially afraid for him as he is nearing the end of what is considered an "average" lifespan. He had it! He had it and he threw it all away!!! What happened?!! I feel almost this sense of utter panic for these people to the point where I want to explode. I wonder if I should be avoiding these places because of how totally ill they make me physically and emotionally. But then I think to myself that my own physical limitations don't allow for me to go out into the world to help but I could be a prayer warrior here inside my little house for these people. While I could easily pray for all non-believers etc generically I also want to be able to pray deliberately for specific persons too. How can I do that if I stay away from forums where they congregate? It's such a conundrum.

Back to the original topic although it is all a bit intermingled....

If any of you reading this have any input as to the question I asked about what/why are some people's eyes and hearts opened to the saving knowledge of Christ and others aren't....feel free to comment. I've also set up an email account expressly for interaction with those who read this blog and have things the would like to say or talk about outside of small comments. Don't stop leaving comments as well as they may be edifying to someone else who reads them but lengthy ideas or back and forth discussions about whatever with me would be easier via email. To that end I am putting my blog email addy up as part of my profile description at the top of my blog beside my avatar picture. If you are a non-believer you too may feel free to talk to me but please I ask you to be respectful as I will be with you. If your email is simply sent to degrade Christ, throw a bunch of bad language around etc...then I won't respond to you and will more than likely block you or direct any future mailings from you to the junk folder. You don't have to agree with me to talk to me but you do have to be calm, respectful and able to engage in a conversation that way.

Albert Einstein - Does God Exist? ANd The Last Words of A dying Man about Heaven and Hell

2009-11-27T16:43:00.001-05:00

The Turkey wasn't the only thing stuffed on Thanksgiving Day

2009-11-26T23:57:00.007-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

My husband and I went to his parents for Thanksgiving day. I always enjoy going there. I enjoy it even more when his sister and her husband and twin daughters are able to go as well. They live fairly far away so it's a fairly long drive for them. This Thanksgiving day was perfect. The weather was just a bit cool, and had just a hint of rain now and then but nothing extreme. My mother-in-law is a fantastic cook and prepared a veritable feast which I was all too happy to help dispose of by eating two full platefuls of food. My husband and I go by the believe that holiday feasts are calorie free days. Well, we actually know better but...well...we like to eat! So, we tell each other about it being a calorie free, guilt free day because it's Thanksgiving. LOL!

It's so wonderful being surrounded by a large family. Everyone chatting and joking around together. My husband would joke around with his brother and his brother's future wife and her son. His sister, her husband and two little girls arrived about an hour after we did and added a lot of bustle and joy. The girls are always entertaining and my sister-in-law and her husband are devoted Catholics and devoted parents who are doing an amazing job of raising these girls. They (the girls) are polite, fun-loving, and a real joy to be around. My own parents wanted to have a large family too but it just didn't work out that way. My father's son was already four years old when my father and mother found each other. The two children they had together, myself and my kid brother were both born with severe birth defects due to a hereditary condition handed down through my mother's side of the family so they made the decision to stop having children. I know she was disappointed because she'd told me as much and mourned the loss of the having the six children they had planed on having. There's also the fact that my older brother and I don't get along well at all. When he was fourteen and I only seven years old, he'd abused me in a way no little girl should have to face. Although I'm very proud of him for getting himself off drugs and alcohol abuse as an adult, I don't trust his or his wife's motives and actions when it comes to dealing with our terminally ill mother. He also lives nearly on the opposite side of the country so we get together only rarely. My parents dream of a large family all gathered around the table for the holidays filling the house with love and laughter was denied them. Anyway, back on topic...

My mother and father-in-law cooked a delicious traditional Thanksgiving meal and it was a wonderful day. We all sat at two large tables. My sister-in-law who is a wonderful example of a Catholic woman of Faith prayed a beautiful prayer. I was offered the opportunity but deferred to her. I wish I was bolder about praying in public. It scares the heck out of me! My prayer style (for lack of a better term) is really very home spun. It's not at all poetic or moving...not the way my sister-in-law's was so I'm glad she's the one that lead prayer. It was a great example to me, actually. I need to get past the feeling that I'm on stage when I pray aloud in front of others. My focus is still on what I sound like to others and not what I sound like to God. It's a terrible fault bordering on sin I think because of my lack of focus on God when I pray aloud. I pray much more easily when I'm alone and my prayers are more genuine and focused on Who I'm praying to rather than who I'm praying in front of at the time.

My brother-in-law is engaged. After a truly horrendous break up of his first marriage and being robbed blind by his ex-wife it's really great to see him in love and happy again. I really like his future wife so far. I haven't had a lot of interaction with her but from what I can see she is loving, fun, down to earth and really makes my brother-in-law smile. He deserves that...to smile. I got to meet her son who is nearly all grown up himself. He seems like a really nice young man if a bit undisciplined. He needs a bit more maturity and most of all he needs the Lord. I'm unsure of where my future sister-in-law's faith lies but it seems be almost non-existent. I say this mainly due to certain little things here and there and the wide-eyed, "I don't know what to do" look on her son's face when we prayed before the meal. I take that to indicate the lack of such behaviors as he was growing up and considering some of the exploits he shared with us after dinner, I would say that God wasn't really included much in their family, if at all. That worries me a bit, of course. My brother-in-law's faith is a tad shaky I think and I know the importance of having God be the leader of a couples household. I'll keep them all in prayer big time.

We got home pretty late. It's about an hour and a half drive one way from their house to ours so my husband and I are pretty tired. I more than he, it seems. I ended up having to take pain medication near the end of the day while at my in-laws house and again after we got home so that's making me pretty tired as well. He's playing games on his computer and I'm working on this blog. I'm willing to bet that he'll be up well into the morning hours. I, on the other hand, am going to go to bed as soon as I post this. I'll call my own parents tomorrow and talk with my mom a bit. My father is deaf and can't hear on the phone. He has a TTY machine to use but he doesn't like using it that much unless he absolutely has to do so. While a lot of people are going to be going shopping tomorrow for Christmas bargains, my husband and I are staying home. We NEVER go out on "black Friday" even if it's only to the movies. The roads will be clogged with impatient drivers who take unnecessary risks. Neither of us wants to be a part of the stress or the crowds. Bargains will be around up until the day before Christmas so we aren't overly worried about it. Plus we just don't have a lot of money to spend on Christmas gifts. He needs to have some gall bladder stones removed, we have a cat needing to be spayed and treated for a chronic illness as well, we have repairs that need to be done on the house that keeps getting put off due to finances and we both need dental work and new eye glasses. Money isn't pouring in and those things take priority. I also wanted to buy some gifts for some under privileged children and families. We'll do what we usually do and buy some small inexpensive gift for each other and just enjoy the true gifts we have been given by our Lord. Gifts of shelter, food, clothes, family, friends, kitties and each other. Even more importantly, we celebrate the birth of Jesus...of God become man for the sole purpose of taking onto Himself the penalty of death for sin that we deserve. Even though most Biblical scholars today agree that the actual birth of Jesus most likely occurred in the Spring, this is the day set aside by Christendom to celebrate it. No one really knows the exact date of Jesus' birth and celebrating it has never been a commandment or even requested by Christ in any documents of which I'm aware. We do so freely simply because we love and honor Him.

Well, I'm falling asleep at the keys now so I'm off to bed. It's Friday...barely....so I will most likely post an "official" Friday blog entry later in the day or early evening.

Obama - Partial Birth Abortion Info

2009-11-25T22:59:00.004-05:00

Note: There are no graphic images on either of these videos.

Keep in mind that as the above abortion is being explained by the abortion doctor it is actually being carried out in a demonstration. At the end all the attending abortion doctors actually applaud as the now dead baby is delivered out after having it's brains sucked out. Lord Jesus, save us!

Bishop Tobin given a chance to actually speak

2009-11-25T22:21:00.004-05:00

I respect this interview by Bill O'Reilly who asked some tough questions AND allowed Bishop Tobin to actually respond. This interview was professional and respectful. Bishop Tobin remains firm that it is our Faith that is the most important issue.

Wednesday November 25, 2009

Bishop Tobin on O'Reilly: Catholic Politicians Must "Quit Your Job and Save Your Soul" Rather than Support Abortion

By Kathleen Gilbert

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island, November 25, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Bishop Thomas Tobin of Rhode Island clarified his reasons for denying pro-abortion politicians Communion on Tuesday, noting that such politicians are not forced to be Catholic - but if they choose to, they must then "understand what the Church teaches, accept those teachings, and live that faith."

"The most important commitment we can make is our faith, because that defines our relationship with God. Nothing is more important than that. And if your job, your profession, your vocation gets in the way of that, you have to quit your job and save your soul," said Tobin in an appearance on the FOX Network's "O'Reilly Factor" Tuesday night.

Bishop Tobin has been at the center of controversy after it was revealed that he told the Catholic pro-abortion Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) in 2007 to refrain from receiving Communion. Kennedy originally sparked the public feud by accusing the Catholic Church of fanning the "flames of dissent and discord" by opposing the pro-abortion House health care bill.

Tobin denied that his decision to ban Rep. Kennedy from Communion was a "punishment."

"Every Catholic has certain obligations, it means something to say you are a Catholic. No one is forced to be a Catholic," said the bishop.

"If you choose freely to be a Catholic it means you do certain things, and you believe certain things, and I think all I'm trying to say to Congressman Kennedy and others who might be involved, say: if you're a Catholic, live up to your faith. Understand what the Church teaches, accept those teachings, and live that faith."

Tobin also defended the Church's basic right to intercede in public debate on behalf of universal moral principles.

"If the church, not just the Catholic Church, but the religious community - if we don't bring these values, this spiritual vision to these discussions, who else will do that?" said Tobin.

The tenor of the interview starkly contrasted with Tobin's appearance on MSNBC's "Hardball" with Chris Matthews Monday night, in which the Catholic Matthews lectured the bishop and accused Tobin of using public policy as leverage in getting Kennedy to heed his authority.

Hardball interviews Bishop Tobin. Bishop Tobin stands firm.

2009-11-24T08:35:00.011-05:00

An interview with Bishop Tobin on the program "Hardball" with interviewer Chris Matthews.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

I am so terribly impressed and humbled by this man of God, this Catholic Bishop that stands firm in the Faith, maintains a respectful attitude even when treated poorly or having his words, intentions etc twisted beyond belief by an interviewer who himself claim to be Catholic. THIS is an example of what it means to be steadfast! THIS is an example of what speaking the truth in love means. THIS is what it means to be devoted to the Truth of Christ's Church no matter the opposition! Of course, the Bishop could barely get a word in edgewise. I cheered the Bishop all the while my heart cried inside me.

Quoted in it's entirety from: http://www.thericatholic.com/news/detail.html?sub_id=2678 (Bolding, colorization, etc are my own)

Statement of Bishop in Response to Congressman's Published Interview of November 22, 2009 11/22/09

"I am disappointed and really surprised that Congressman Patrick Kennedy has chosen to re-open the public discussion about his practice of the faith and his reception of Holy Communion.

This comes almost two weeks after the Congressman indicated to local media that he would no longer comment publicly on his faith or his relationship with the Catholic Church. The Congressman's public comments require me to reply.

On February 21, 2007, I wrote to Congressman Kennedy stating: "In light of the Church's clear teaching, and your consistent actions, therefore, I believe it is inappropriate for you to be receiving Holy Communion and I now ask respectfully that you refrain from doing so." My request came in light of the new statement of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops that said, "If a Catholic in his or her personal or professional life were knowingly and obstinately to repudiate her definite teachings on moral issues, he or she would seriously diminish his or her communion with the Church. Reception of Holy Communion in such a situation would not accord with the nature of the Eucharistic celebration, so that he or she should refrain." (Happy Are Those Who Are Called to His Supper, December, 2006)

In the same letter I wrote to Congressman Kennedy, "I am writing to you personally and confidentially as a pastor addressing a member of his flock . . . At the present time I have no need or intention to make this a public issue." I also indicated, "I am available to discuss this matter with you in person at any mutually convenient time and place. I would welcome the opportunity to do so."

On February 28, 2007, the Congressman responded to me, "I have the utmost respect for the work you do on behalf of the Catholic community in Rhode Island. . . I understand your pastoral advice was confidential in nature and given with the best intentions for my personal spiritual welfare."

I am disappointed that the Congressman would make public my pastoral and confidential request of nearly three years ago that sought to provide solely for his spiritual well-being.

I have no desire to continue the discussion of Congressman Kennedy's spiritual life in public. At the same time, I will absolutely respond publicly and strongly whenever he attacks the Catholic Church, misrepresents the teachings of the Church, or issues inaccurate statements about my pastoral ministry.

As I wrote to the Congressman in February of 2007, and repeated in my public letter earlier this month, I am willing and even anxious to meet with him, to discuss these matters. My door remains open. However, it should be absolutely clear the Congressman himself has once again chosen to make this discussion a matter of public record.

In the meantime, I will continue to pray - sincerely and fervently - for his conversion and repentance, and for his personal and spiritual well-being. I wish him well. "

From: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/nov/09112409.html

Catholic League Rebukes MSNBC's Matthews for 'Insulting Lecture' in Bp. Tobin Interview

By Kathleen Gilbert

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 24, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a heated exchange Monday night, MSNBC "Hardball" host Chris Matthews accused Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island of hijacking public policy debate by telling a pro-abortion Catholic politician not to receive Communion. The president of the Catholic League, Bill Donohue, has shot back against Matthews' treatment of the Church prelate in that interview, which he called "quite insulting."

Bishop Tobin appeared on the program to discuss his exchange with U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), who recently accused the Catholic Church of fanning the "flames of dissent and discord" by opposing the pro-abortion House health care bill. Tobin had asked the Catholic Kennedy in 2007 to refrain from receiving Communion because of his pro-abortion record.

Matthews, who is a Catholic, questioned Tobin's objection to Kennedy's voting record as a violation of the separation of Church and state. Tobin responded that his actions as a Church authority were not intended to craft public policy, but to admonish Catholic politicians to be faithful to the teachings of the Church.

"Keep in mind what we believe about abortion. Every time an abortion takes place, a baby dies," said Tobin. "I don't know how people of good conscience, especially people with ah Catholic background, could take that position in good conscience."

Matthews spent much of the interview demanding details from Bishop Tobin on what kind of penalty should be imposed if abortion were no longer legal. Tobin repeatedly demurred, saying he was not qualified to answer specific aspects of theoretical legislation.

"Maybe that's instructive to you, sir, your Excellency ... you say you don't know how to [write the law]; well, you ought to try before you tell [Kennedy] what he's doing wrong,' Matthews shot back.

"I would contest that your problem is you haven't gotten people to obey your moral code through teaching, and you've resorted now to use the law to do your enforcement for you."

Tobin answered by saying it is "not at all unusual to have the moral law reflected in the law of the land." "How that is played out, that's not the job of the Church. ... My job is to try to promote the truth of the moral law, and to encourage members of my Church, who freely choose to be Catholic, to follow the dictates of their faith," said Tobin.

In concluding the interview, Matthews told the bishop that, by "telling public officials how to set public policy, you're stepping beyond moral teaching, and you're basically assuming an authority which I don't think is yours."

"Obviously we will disagree on that point, thank you," Tobin replied.

Matthews continued: "I do believe that Jesus had it right when he said, 'Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's,' and as you admitted on four or five occasions, you don't know how to write law, and writing law is very tricky in a secular society in which you and I live, even with our moral conduct, I hope, acceptable to God."

"I will reflect on that, if you reflect on the teachings of the Church," Tobin countered.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue said that he was "deluged" with feedback from viewers after the interview. Donohue said that after he watched the first part of the interview, "I wondered what all the fuss was all about: Chris was just being his usual aggressive self," said Donohue. But, he says, as the interview continued "it didn't take long before Matthews literally spun out of control."

"Matthews proceeded with an extended and quite insulting lecture. He had absolutely no interest in a discussion on the question of the morality and legality of abortion - all he wanted to do was to make the bishop sit there and listen to his rant," he continued.

"No non-Catholic would ever treat a bishop this way. But too many liberal Catholics, especially Irish Catholics, think they are exempt from the same standards of civility that apply to others. They are flatly wrong."

To contact Hardball executive producer John Reiss: hardball@msnbc.com

Be Still and Know that I Am God

2009-11-22T22:35:00.005-05:00

I'm better today than I was yesterday. I still struggle with the knowledge that I am not all I should be, all I wish to be...for Christ. God is slowing reminding me that fruit does not bloom on a tree over night nor does a newer tree produce as much fruit as an older one generally. He reminds me to wait upon Him in stillness. He calls me to not allow the enemy of my soul to refocus my eyes on my failings so as to take them off of my Savior. Instead I am to acknowledge those failings as I life them up to my Savior all the while not taking my eyes off of Christ, my Redeemer. Introspection is a useful thing but I must not allow myself to stop at that point. From there I must lift up my failings and my weaknesses to the One who can and will forgive me and renew my strength. He reminds me that there is always a reason, that all is within the confines of His perfect plan for me. Growth is seldom without struggle. I am to stop casting my eyes down upon myself and lift them up to the Lord, rest in His peace, grow under His guidance. The timing is His...not mine. I am to be steadfast and allow myself the natural progression of my Faith as He leads me. I cannot rush through the process. Only by growing at the natural rate and by traveling the course of Faith that God has set before me can any changes for the better that occur in me be real and authentic and lasting. Anything else would be but pretense and false. He whispers gently to my soul, "Be still and know that I am God".

I got my Ignatius leather cover Bible today. It's beautiful! I absolutely adore it! The typeset is clean and clear...very easy to read. It's not too small. The pages are not tissue paper thin so there is very little shadowing of the the pages below coming through. The paper is actually satiny smooth but not at all overly shiny. They are smooth to the touch and much less porous than most Bible paper. I'm sure that a nice highlighter made especially for bibles would not bleed through the paper and that thrills me no end. The size is perfect. It's not too big nor is it tiny. It not super thick or heavy. The pages are gold edged. The only thing I dislike is the imitation or leather-like cover. It will crack and dry out and be destroyed very quickly. What I plan on doing is sending the Bible to a book bindery and having it rebound in a nice calf skin or goat skin cover. That will make the Bible last and last. It will protect the beautiful pages inside and be much more comfortable to hold. Calf skin can be so buttery soft but strong and durable too. I can get it rebound and even have the pages re-gilded in genuine red under gold using a method that doesn't spray the gilding on the pages so that it flakes off and gets scratched up easily but rather so it leaves them very very sparkly and the gilding stays put for a really long time. Yeah, I know...it'll be a bit expensive but I'm making it a Christmas present to myself with the money my parents always sends my husband and I in lieu of gifts. It's really difficult for them to go shopping especially with my mother's failing health. So that will be what I use it on. There are a couple of nice binderies I've found on the web who do excellent work at reasonable prices and who have a great reputation. I actually will have two different copies the the Ignatius Bible. One that will be kept pristine without any writing in it or anything. That's the one I'll have rebound in calf skin...and the other one which I will allow myself to highlight etc.

Somehow my husband and I missed Mass today. I'm not sure whether the hours were changed for the winter season or if I simply misread them. When we drove up to the church it was utterly dark inside and there were no cars anywhere. I'm really REALLY disappointed that I missed it. I was so looking forward to receiving the Body of my Lord and perhaps spending some time in prayer and adoration. I will do that last part here at home. Next week I'll call the church ahead of time and double check the Mass hours.

Back tracking a little in subject....
I really am feeling much better today. I forgot about being still. I startled to flail about inside myself at the realizations I put forth in my last post. While those realizations haven't gone away they are no longer creating such despair inside me. Instead I recognize it for what it really is...the process of the renewing of my life by the indwelling Holy Spirit. It might feel awful at times while it's happening...and I may even feel shame at some of the dirt that gets kicked up in the process...but a vessel cannot be filled with the wonderful holiness of God if it is still occupied by the dirt of a former self...my former life when I was not with God. My husband told me something that was so simple it struck me silent. I believe it was God speaking through him. He said "If you were not truly saved, not truly converted, then this wouldn't bother you so much. It wouldn't even cross your mind."

Well, that's about it for me tonight. I haven't slept in over 24 hours and I need to go to be and pass out for about 12 hours. Insomnia, migraines...all part of a normal day for me more often than not. Luckily the headache that was threatening went away after I finally got some food into my stomach. Now it's time for sleep......I hope.

My Heart Cries Out for Authentic Faith

2009-11-22T03:20:00.013-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

In my previous post I commented only that I'm spiritually sad. I had no more words. Nothing to really express the pain...the deepness of it. I'm not sure I do now but I want to try so bear with me if I ramble or repeat myself a bit.

This came on after I had had an exchange...a respectful one, mind you...online with someone who has a deep seated anti-Catholic bias. This person is a Christian who has a very strong desire to see unity among Christians which I can support whole heartedly. But while this person wants unity, they also express a great deal of loathing for the Catholic Church especially and denominationalism in general. I fully agree with them that Christian unity would be ideal...no problems there. But at the same time they express their desire for unity they express strong anti-Catholic sentiments. It seems counter-productive to me. I've said before in my blog that the TRUE Church or "true" Body of Christ is not found inside a denomination which is a surface thing but in the Holy Spirit that indwells any and all believers who have undergone an authentic salvation experience. Once people are fully surrendered to God they focus less, in my opinion anyway, on the denominational tags or differences in worship etc. The "true" Church is the Spiritual one. I believe this is the unifying glue or force that binds us all as brothers and sisters under the Lordship of Christ.

I tried to point out to this person that a more gentle, more loving approach to Catholic Christians and Christians of any denomination would be more productive towards their goal. It was just plain hard to read that they think that the Catholic Church "usurped" their position. I can fully admit that there have been abuses by the leaders of the Church at various times in history. That can be said and is true of every denomination at some point or other. We are redeemed but we are still prone to sin...even spiritual leadership. Most Protestants or anti-Catholics have a real hard time with wrapping their heads around how a Pope can make infallible decisions in matters of faith and morals and then turn around and make sinful choices in other areas. It was one of the biggest things I used to have trouble with myself when I was a fundamentalist. It's still hard for me to try to explain the difference to them. Even some fellow Catholics have a hard time with this thought process.

I feel as though I failed badly in trying to communicate some food for thought and so forth to this person. I didn't expect some light bulb moment to occur where they suddenly changed their entire thought process but I guess I wasn't prepared for what seemed to me to be an utter failing on my part to somehow make sense to them in some small way. This was only one aspect of what was and is making me really sad.

I want so much to be an obvious example of Christ to people. I want that so much it hurts. I'm not talking about preaching or anything but just in the way I live my life, in the fruit of my life, as it points to Christ for those with whom I come into contact. I am brought not just to my knees but to laying face down on the floor so-to-speak by the knowledge that there is absolutely nothing I have to offer Christ. I mean I have no redeeming qualities. There is nothing, absolutely nothing I can offer Him. I have seen my worthlessness in such a profound way. I'm not talking about poor self esteem. I'm talking about worthiness. I am not now, have never been, nor will I ever be...worthy of Christ. His salvation is totally one sided. He gives and I take.

I see inside myself all the filth and junk in there. I see past the outside of the cup. People may think I'm so "spiritual" because I know what to say, know the Bible pretty well, etc...but I can see past all that to what's actually inside me and it fills me with a sadness I can't quite express. I wonder if I am truly and really saved. I wonder this because if I was...wouldn't I be a new creation in Christ? Wouldn't I be showing good fruit in my life not just on the outside in the way I follow the "rules" but in the inside too? If I were truly and authentically saved and a new creation...wouldn't I have more charitable thoughts, be much slower to anger, speak more gently and lovingly, be more merciful? Wouldn't my inner most thoughts be more conformed to Christ? Wouldn't my knee-jerk reactions inside my head and heart be purer? I know I can't be and won't be perfect. But I also know the depth of wickedness of my thoughts! I hear how I -really- think regardless of what I say. Sure, it's good that I don't allow myself to do or say some of the horrid things that enter my mind or heart but if I was truly saved and surrendered to God as to be a new creation wouldn't my inner most thoughts also be redeemed and made new as well? I hate this stuff! I don't want to have this duality! I want God to be proud of me. I want Him to say "well done my good and faithful servant". But in all reality, it would be right for Him to say, "depart from me you evil doer". It would be right because the outside of the cup and the inside of the cup aren't the same. One appears shiny and one doesn't. Have I just been fooling myself all this time that I am truly converted but have been just trying to "do" the outward signs of conversation while maintaining a cesspool inside my heart?!

This is the main reason for my sadness. I'm heart sick. I look inside and make myself sick at what I see. I am not a nice person, a good person, a good example, a faithful person...all those things that a truly converted person...someone who has been made a new creation and been grafted into the vine is said to become. Are my outward signs of faith just a self-righteousness made up from my own power...just a shiny facade? I have to wonder because of the nastiness I see in my heart underneath it all.

I want the inside to be conformed to Christ so much! I want to be His inside as well as out. I want there to be no Grand Canyon sized difference between my internal and external faith. I want it to be real....true....when people are looking AND when they aren't. I want this so much I hurt...and cry...and feel sad.

I'm Sad

2009-11-21T04:54:00.002-05:00

Image by Arianyx via Flickr

I'm sad. There. That's it. Straight forward truth.

I'm sad in a deep place. I have no idea why. I have no real reason in my life right now to be sad. I have a little bit of an idea about some of what's going on. I recognize spiritual sadness when I feel it because it's so deep and still. Earthly sadness is different...more frantic and in motion. Spiritual sadness just kind of sits there in the quiet places of my heart like lead. I'm not ready yet to share more than this. Maybe tomorrow or later today. Right now I don't have the words for what's going on, for my thoughts, etc.

Obama hedges (again) about allowing Federal Funding and Tax Payers Dollars to Pay for Abortions

2009-11-20T05:21:00.012-05:00

http://www.lifesitenews.com/

Thursday November 19, 2009

Obama Evades Questioning on Stupak Amendment in FOX Interview
By Kathleen Gilbert

BEIJING, November 19, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a rare interview with FOX news last night, President Obama dodged point-blank questioning concerning his position on the Stupak amendment in the health care bill.

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.

Thursday November 19, 2009

Pro-Abortion Lawmakers Shower Praise on Senate Bill's Phony Abortion Compromise
By Kathleen Gilbert

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 19, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The phony compromise language unveiled in the Senate health care bill Wednseday night has already won high praise from pro-abortion lawmakers on Capitol Hill; yet, it has not fared as well under the scrutiny of the National Right to Life Committee, who slammed the bill's abortion funding as "completely unacceptable."

The Senate language closely reflects the "Capps amendment" from an earlier version of the House bill, which had been advanced by the pro-abortion Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA) as a false compromise measure on abortion instead of the pro-life Stupak/Pitts amendment. (The Senate bill can be viewed here.)

National Right to Life Committee legislative Director Douglas Johnson said it was regrettable, but predictable that Reid would abandon the Stupak/Pitts amendment for the "hollow" language.

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nv.) has rejected the bipartisan Stupak-Pitts Amendment and has substituted completely unacceptable language that would result in coverage of abortion on demand in two big new federal government programs," said Johnson.

"Reid seeks to cover elective abortions in two big new federal health programs, but tries to conceal that unpopular reality with layers of contrived definitions and hollow bookkeeping requirements."

The Senate bill explicitly authorizes the federal Secretary of Health and Human services to require coverage of any and all abortions through a government-funded health insurance option. This means government-appropriated funds would go to elective abortions, violating Hyde-amendment policy. The bill also allows taxpayer subsidies to help purchase plans that cover elective abortions.

The Stupak amendment, on the other hand, fully restored Hyde-amendment restrictions on federal funding for elective abortion in the House bill. Under that amendment, the government-run insurance option would not fund elective abortions, and recipients of taxpayer insurance subsidies would purchase elective abortion coverage with private money.

Major pro-life organizations, including the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), have consistently stated that only the Stupak language acceptably restores the ban on federal abortion funding. Earlier this month, the USCCB and the NRLC jointly tore apart another House "compromise" attempt that also failed to uphold the ban.

Some pro-abortion Senators have already exalted Reid's abortion language, claiming that it accurately reflects the Hyde amendment.

"Senator Reid did an excellent job of crafting language that maintains the decades long compromise of no federal funds for abortion," gushed Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA). Boxer has a consistently 100% pro-abortion rating from NARAL.

Late Wednedsay, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, who also votes largely pro-abortion, claimed to reporters that Reid's bill "extends the Hyde amendment to these programs so the status quo is maintained." Rep. Capps, another 100% NARAL-approved legislator and author of the House's phony compromise, praised Reid's language and noted that it "closely mirrors my language" in the original House bill.

The same legislators had lambasted the Stupak language as "illogical, discriminatory, and unnecessary" (Capps) and a "very radical amendment which would really tear apart compromise" (Boxer).

((My notation inserted: That's what the world is all about now..."compromise". But we can not, MUST not compromise on this and still call ourselves Christians much less Catholics.))

By claiming to uphold the Hyde amendment, pro-abortion lawmakers could be hoping to attract the pro-life majority opinion regarding the bill's funding: 61% of respondents in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Wednesday opposed the use of federal funds for elective abortion, with only 37% in favor.

Bishop Thomas Tobin - A "No Compromise" Christian

2009-11-20T04:27:00.007-05:00

I am quoting below from http://www.lifesitenews.com/ concerning the very public communications between Congressman Patrick Kennedy and Bishop Thomas Tobin concerning the abortion issues included in the new health care reform package. I applaud Bishop Tobin for his steadfastness in the truth, his fearlessness in the face of an increasingly compromising world, and his ability to administer the truth with conviction and love. As usual, colorized phrases, bolding and so on are my own.

Thursday October 8, 2009

U.S. Bishops Will "Vigorously" Oppose Health Care if Abortion Concerns Not Addressed
By John Jalsevac

October 8, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Three U.S. bishops have written to Congress expressing their "disappointment" that the healthcare bills currently being considered in Congress have not addressed the issue of federal funding of abortion, and warning that unless their concerns are addressed, the U.S. bishops will have to oppose "vigorously" the health care reform legislation.

Writing on behalf of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), the three bishops said in a letter released today, "We are writing to express our disappointment that progress has not been made on the three priority criteria for health care reform that we have conveyed previously to Congress."

"In fact," they point out, "the Senate Finance Committee rejected a conscience rights amendment accepted earlier by the House Energy and Commerce Committee."

The three signatories of the letter, Cardinal Justin Rigali, Bishop William Murphy and Bishop John Wester, chair the Committees on Pro-Life Activities, Domestic Justice and Human Development, and Migration, respectively, for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). They had previously sent a letter to the senate on September 30, outlining their concerns with the healthcare overhaul plan.

The bishops go on to threaten that, if the healthcare legislation fails to meet the core principles outlined by them in their previous communications, "we will have no choice but to oppose the bill."

Those core principles include ensuring that federal funds do not pay for abortions and the inclusion of strenuous conscience protections. The bishops also emphasize the need for affordable care, and for the legislation to provide coverage for legal immigrants.

"We sincerely hope that the legislation will not fall short of our criteria," write the bishops. "However, we remain apprehensive when amendments protecting freedom of conscience and ensuring no taxpayer money for abortion are defeated in committee votes. If acceptable language in these areas cannot be found, we will have to oppose the health care bill vigorously."

In an interview yesterday, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs responded to the bishops' previously stated concerns by prolonging the White House tactic of simply denying the abortion mandate in the healthcare legislation.

When asked about the bishops' statement from their September 30th letter, saying that the health reform bills still have not barred federal funds from paying for abortion, Gibbs responded simply, "Well, I don't want to get me in trouble at church, but I would mention there's a law that precludes the use of federal funds for abortion that isn't going to be changed in these health care bills."

Gibbs was presumably referring to the Hyde Amendment, which has traditionally prevented federal funds from paying for abortions. However, legal analysts have pointed out that the health care legislation includes amendments, such as the Capps-Waxman Amendment, that specifically allow federal funds to pay for abortions under the plan.

Douglas Johnson, legislative director for the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the national federation of right-to-life affiliates, said in response: "Gibbs' statement is one more proof, if any more were needed, that the White House is actively engaged in a political smuggling operation - an attempt to achieve funding of elective abortion by the federal government, cloaked in smokescreens of contrived language and outright deception."

In their September 30 letter to the Senate, the three bishops, representing the USCCB, had written, "No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion."

"It is essential" they said, "to clearly include longstanding and widely supported federal restrictions on abortion funding/mandates and protections for rights of conscience."

But so far, they observed, "the health reform bills considered in committee, including the new Senate Finance Committee bill, have not met President Obama's challenge of barring use of federal dollars for abortion and maintaining current conscience laws. These deficiencies must be corrected."

The bishops also emphasized the need for strenuous conscience protections for healthcare workers.

"For decades," they wrote, "…Congress has respected the right of health care providers not to be involved in any abortions or abortion referrals, and has respected moral and religious objections in other areas as well.

"The Weldon amendment to the Labor/HHS appropriations act, approved by Congress each year since 2004, forbids any federal agency or program, and any state or local government receiving federal funds under the Act, to discriminate against individual or institutional health care providers or insurers because they decline to provide, pay for, provide coverage of, or refer for abortion."

They concluded, "Health care reform legislation should reflect longstanding and widely supported current policies on abortion funding, mandates, and conscience protections because they represent sound morality, wise policy, and political reality."

Friday October 23, 2009

Rep. Kennedy Questions Whether Bishops "Pro-Life" over Opposition to Healthcare: Local Bishop Demands Apology
By Peter J. Smith

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island, October 23, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Catholic Bishop of Providence has lambasted Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) for smearing the Catholic bishops over their opposition to the health-care reform bills going through Congress because they would fund abortion. Kennedy, the son of the late pro-abortion Catholic Sen. Ted Kennedy, said objections to abortion and conscience protections in the bills were just a "red herring" to cover the bishops' refusal to support health-care for 50 million uninsured Americans.

"I thought they were pro-life" Kennedy told a reporter from Cybercast News Service. "If the church is pro-life, then they ought to be for health care reform because it's going to provide health care that are going to keep people alive."

Kennedy attacked the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) for sending a letter to all 535 members of the House of Representatives that informed them the Catholic Church must oppose any legislation that would include funding for abortions and fail to include conscience-protections for health-care providers in health-care reform. (see coverage)

"Much-needed reform of our health care system must be pursued in ways that serve the life and dignity of all, never in ways that undermine or violate these fundamental values," said the letter. The letter was signed by bishops William Murphy of Rockville-Centre, Justin Cardinal Rigali of Philadelphia, and John Wester of Salt-Lake City, who chair the USCCB committees on Domestic Justice and Human Development, Pro-Life Activities, and Migration, respectively.

However the Rhode Island congressman said that for the Catholic Church not to support what he called "the biggest social justice issue of our time" called into question its pro-life credentials.

The Church's objections over abortion are an "absolute red herring" that only serve to "fan the flames of dissent and discord," he said.

However, Kennedy's disparagement of the Catholic Church has not been taken lightly by his Church's prelates. The bishop of Providence, Rhode Island, Thomas Tobin, swiftly responded, excoriating Kennedy in a press release that stated that the congressman was a "disappointment to the Catholic Church and the citizens of Rhode Island."

"Congressman Patrick Kennedy's statement about the Catholic Church's position on health care reform is irresponsible and ignorant of the facts. But the Congressman is correct in stating that 'he can't understand.' He got that part right," said Tobin.

"As I wrote to Congressman Kennedy and other members of the Rhode Island Congressional Delegation recently, the Bishops of the United States are indeed in favor of comprehensive health care reform and have been for many years," continued Tobin.

"But we are adamantly opposed to health care legislation that threatens the life of unborn children, requires taxpayers to pay for abortion, rations health care, or compromises the conscience of individuals."

Tobin concluded by saying that Kennedy "owes us an apology for his irresponsible comments" adding, "It is my fervent hope and prayer that he will find a way to provide more effective and morally responsible leadership for our state."

Wednesday November 11, 2009

Bishop Tobin's Public Letter to Rep. Kennedy

Dear Congressman Kennedy:

“The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic.” (Congressman Patrick Kennedy)

Since our recent correspondence has been rather public, I hope you don’t mind if I share a few reflections about your practice of the faith in this public forum. I usually wouldn’t do that – that is speak about someone’s faith in a public setting – but in our well-documented exchange of letters about health care and abortion, it has emerged as an issue. I also share these words publicly with the thought that they might be instructive to other Catholics, including those in prominent positions of leadership.

For the moment I’d like to set aside the discussion of health care reform, as important and relevant as it is, and focus on one statement contained in your letter of October 29, 2009, in which you write, “The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic.” That sentence certainly caught my attention and deserves a public response, lest it go unchallenged and lead others to believe it’s true. And it raises an important question: What does it mean to be a Catholic?

“The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic.” Well, in fact, Congressman, in a way it does. Although I wouldn’t choose those particular words, when someone rejects the teachings of the Church, especially on a grave matter, a life-and-death issue like abortion, it certainly does diminish their ecclesial communion, their unity with the Church. This principle is based on the Sacred Scripture and Tradition of the Church and is made more explicit in recent documents.

For example, the “Code of Canon Law” says, “Lay persons are bound by an obligation and possess the right to acquire a knowledge of Christian doctrine adapted to their capacity and condition so that they can live in accord with that doctrine.” (Canon 229, #1)

The “Catechism of the Catholic Church” says this: “Mindful of Christ’s words to his apostles, ‘He who hears you, hears me,’ the faithful receive with docility the teaching and directives that their pastors give them in different forms.” (#87)

Or consider this statement of the Church: “It would be a mistake to confuse the proper autonomy exercised by Catholics in political life with the claim of a principle that prescinds from the moral and social teaching of the Church.” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 2002)

There’s lots of canonical and theological verbiage there, Congressman, but what it means is that if you don’t accept the teachings of the Church your communion with the Church is flawed, or in your own words, makes you “less of a Catholic.”

But let’s get down to a more practical question; let’s approach it this way: What does it mean, really, to be a Catholic? After all, being a Catholic has to mean something, right?

Well, in simple terms – and here I refer only to those more visible, structural elements of Church membership – being a Catholic means that you’re part of a faith community that possesses a clearly defined authority and doctrine, obligations and expectations. It means that you believe and accept the teachings of the Church, especially on essential matters of faith and morals; that you belong to a local Catholic community, a parish; that you attend Mass on Sundays and receive the sacraments regularly; that you support the Church, personally, publicly, spiritually and financially.

Congressman, I’m not sure whether or not you fulfill the basic requirements of being a Catholic, so let me ask: Do you accept the teachings of the Church on essential matters of faith and morals, including our stance on abortion? Do you belong to a local Catholic community, a parish? Do you attend Mass on Sundays and receive the sacraments regularly? Do you support the Church, personally, publicly, spiritually and financially?

In your letter you say that you “embrace your faith.” Terrific. But if you don’t fulfill the basic requirements of membership, what is it exactly that makes you a Catholic? Your baptism as an infant? Your family ties? Your cultural heritage?

Your letter also says that your faith “acknowledges the existence of an imperfect humanity.” Absolutely true. But in confronting your rejection of the Church’s teaching, we’re not dealing just with “an imperfect humanity” – as we do when we wrestle with sins such as anger, pride, greed, impurity or dishonesty. We all struggle with those things, and often fail.

Your rejection of the Church’s teaching on abortion falls into a different category – it’s a deliberate and obstinate act of the will; a conscious decision that you’ve re-affirmed on many occasions. Sorry, you can’t chalk it up to an “imperfect humanity.” Your position is unacceptable to the Church and scandalous to many of our members. It absolutely diminishes your communion with the Church.

Congressman Kennedy, I write these words not to embarrass you or to judge the state of your conscience or soul. That’s ultimately between you and God. But your description of your relationship with the Church is now a matter of public record, and it needs to be challenged. I invite you, as your bishop and brother in Christ, to enter into a sincere process of discernment, conversion and repentance. It’s not too late for you to repair your relationship with the Church, redeem your public image, and emerge as an authentic “profile in courage,” especially by defending the sanctity of human life for all people, including unborn children. And if I can ever be of assistance as you travel the road of faith, I would be honored and happy to do so.

Sincerely yours,

Thomas J. Tobin

Bishop of Providence

Wednesday November 11, 2009

Catholic Bishop Publishes Extraordinary Letter Re: "Obstinate" Kennedy's Abortion Support
Tobin says to Kennedy, "Your position is unacceptable to the Church and scandalous to many of our members"
By Peter J. Smith

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island, November 11, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - After getting a public rebuke from his own bishop over abortion advocacy, Rep. Patrick Kennedy has refused to dialogue any further, calling it "very disconcerting" that his bishop would publicly declare he is not a Catholic in good standing.

The Providence Journal reports that Kennedy - the son of the late Sen. Ted Kennedy - stated he was "not going to dignify with an answer" the public rebuke published by Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin that stated Kennedy could not consider himself a Catholic in good-standing and still support abortion.

Kennedy had earlier asserted in an Oct. 29 letter - the latest public back-and-forth between him and Bishop Tobin - that, "The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic."

Although the two men were scheduled to meet on Thursday to discuss Kennedy's abortion support, Bishop Tobin viewed Kennedy's assertion as a bridge too far, saying it "deserves a public response, lest it go unchallenged and lead others to believe it's true."

In a public letter released in the diocesan newspaper on Monday - just two days after Kennedy voted in the House against adding the Pitts-Stupak amendment to the health-care bill - the Catholic prelate made clear that disagreeing with the bishops on a "grave matter" like abortion "certainly does diminish their ecclesial communion, their unity with the Church."

"[I]f you don't accept the teachings of the Church your communion with the Church is flawed, or in your own words, makes you 'less of a Catholic,'" insisted Tobin, pointing to Church documents, Sacred Scripture, and Church Tradition to back him up.

Tobin also addressed the question of whether Kennedy could be considered a Catholic on a practical level.

"Do you accept the teachings of the Church on essential matters of faith and morals, including our stance on abortion? Do you belong to a local Catholic community, a parish? Do you attend Mass on Sundays and receive the sacraments regularly? Do you support the Church, personally, publicly, spiritually and financially?"

The bishop continued, "In your letter you say that you 'embrace your faith.' Terrific. But if you don't fulfill the basic requirements of membership, what is it exactly that makes you a Catholic? Your baptism as an infant? Your family ties? Your cultural heritage?"

Tobin also rejected Kennedy's defense that his advocacy of abortion fell into the same "imperfect humanity" that has to wrestle with "sins such as anger, pride, greed, impurity or dishonesty."

"We all struggle with those things, and often fail," Tobin said. However, rejecting the Church's teaching on abortion, the bishop said, "falls into a different category - it's a deliberate and obstinate act of the will; a conscious decision that you've re-affirmed on many occasions."

"Sorry, you can't chalk it up to an 'imperfect humanity.' Your position is unacceptable to the Church and scandalous to many of our members. It absolutely diminishes your communion with the Church."

The Bishop of Providence, nonetheless, invited Kennedy "to enter into a sincere process of discernment, conversion and repentance" and offered his personal assistance if the Congressman requested it.

"It's not too late for you to repair your relationship with the Church, redeem your public image, and emerge as an authentic 'profile in courage,' especially by defending the sanctity of human life for all people, including unborn children," concluded Tobin. "And if I can ever be of assistance as you travel the road of faith, I would be honored and happy to do so."

Tobin's response looks like it may be the last word in the public debate between Kennedy and him. Kennedy brusquely told the Providence Journal that he was "not going to dignify with an answer" Tobin's public letter, adding, "I'm not going to engage [in] this anymore."

Kennedy's meeting with Bishop Tobin has been postponed for now, although Kennedy indicated he was willing to resume provided that matters of faith remained "between us."

The Providence Diocese told the Journal that the bishop was only responding to Kennedy's public comments, and that if the Congressman wanted to meet with Tobin on Thursday, the bishop would be available.

To Contact the Bishop of Providence

Most Rev. Thomas J. Tobin, D.D.
Diocese of Providence
One Cathedral Square
Providence, RI 02903-3695
Tel: (401) 278-4500
Fax: (401) 278-4654

Email: Contact the Bishop via the Office of Communications: kdavis@dioceseofprovidence.org

Bible Translations - A Catholic Perspective

2009-11-19T07:45:00.014-05:00

I've been researching the differences in Bible translations. I've been amazed at what I've found. I'm not in any of the "this version ONLY" camps but I am pretty darned picky about reading a translation that retains the accuracy of the original languages. I little change here...a little change there...and a passage and even a foundational lesson about Faith can be totally different! I'm posting some of the things I've run across below. These are not my words and I will give the web addy of each so you can read more extensively if you wish. As usual any coloring of text, bolding or italics to highlight various things is my own. I know there's a lot of information below but you really need to read it over if you love the Word of God and want to read a Holy Bible that retains His words accurately as possible in English.

From http://www.saintaquinas.com/bible_versions.html

Translations of the Bible vary markedly according to their readability and precision. The Latin Vulgate Bible, translated by St. Jerome from the Septuagint Cannon (LXX) of the Old Testament, is considered the "official" Bible of the Catholic Church. The Church assures us that the text of the Vulgate is substantially correct with the originals insofar that it does not conflict with the originals in doctrine. Therefore the Latin Vulgate version of the Sacred Scriptures is the primary Bible of the Church. The ecumenical Council of Trent declared that the Catholic Church, "ordains and declares, that the said old and vulgate edition, which, by the lengthened usage of so many years, has been approved of in the Church, be, in public lectures, disputations, sermons and expositions, held as authentic; and that no one is to dare, or presume to reject it under any pretext whatever (Council of Trent, fourth Session)".

We must be careful when reading dynamic versions of the Bible as translated by Protestant scholars. In order to create a modern English translation with increased readability, biblical scholars will often "summarize" a passage’s translation into modern English. Unfortunately, this means that the author will sometimes allow their biases to creep into the translated text. For instance, the rendering of John 3:16 in a literal translation, such as the Catholic Douay-Rheims Bible (DRC), would say, "For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting." However, a popular dynamic Protestant translation, the New International Version (NIV), quotes John 3:16 as, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." Note how the NIV omits the word "may" before the phrase "have life everlasting." Clearly, Protestant bias, whether inadvertent or not, has crept into the NIV text. Protestants commonly believe that salvation is dependent only on having "faith" in God, without consideration of works of righteousness. The skewed translation of the dynamic NIV alludes to the Protestant belief that faith in Christ is all that is needed for salvation; a view which Catholic doctrine rejects. Therefore, it is important for an inexperienced biblical reader to either read a reliable literal translation (such as the Douay-Rheims or the 1611 King James Version) or a Catholic dynamic translation (such as the New American Bible).

And from http://www.catholic.com/library/Bible_Translations_Guide.asp

The disadvantage of dynamic translation is that there is a price to pay for readability. Dynamic translations lose precision because they omit subtle cues to the meaning of a passage that only literal translations preserve. They also run a greater risk of reading the translators’ doctrinal views into the text because of the greater liberty in how to render it.

For example, dynamic Protestant translations, such as the NIV, tend to translate the Greek word ergon and its derivatives as "work" when it reinforces Protestant doctrine but as something else (such as "deeds" or "doing") when it would serve Catholic doctrine.

The NIV renders Romans 4:2 "If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works (ergon), he had something to boast about—but not before God." This passage is used to support the Protestant doctrine of salvation by faith alone. But the NIV translates the erg- derivatives in Romans 2:6-7 differently: "God ‘will give to each person according to what he has done (erga).’ To those who by persistence in doing (ergou) good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life."

If the erg- derivatives were translated consistently as "work" then it would be clear that the passage says God will judge "every person according to his works" and will give eternal life to those who seek immortality "by persistence in working good"—statements that support the Catholic view of salvation.
Even when there is no doctrinal agenda involved, it is difficult to do word studies in dynamic translations because of inconsistency in how words are rendered. Beyond this, the intent of the sacred author can be obscured.

Finally, from http://www.cathtruth.com/catholicbible/cathprot.htm

Catholic And Protestant Bibles

The Protestants of the sixteenth century objected to the additional books because of the doctrinal teachings of these books. The Second Book of Machabees, for example, contains the doctrine of purgatory, of prayers and sacrifices for the dead (12:39-46). The book of Tobias teaches the importance in the eyes of God of good works. The Protestants could not reject some without excluding all of the additional books. Hence, in drawing up their list of Old Testament books they went back to the first collection of Biblical books of the Palestinian Jews. They removed the additional books, which had been in the Bible up till 1517 and placed them at the end of the Bible in a special appendix. In addition, they labelled them as "apocryphal" (spurious, uninspired), a designation which helped to lower them in the estimation of Protestant readers.

The Lutheran and Anglican Bibles still carry these books in the appendix or give them at least a secondary place. But the other Protestant churches reject them entirely.

The Catholic Church has always considered these books as inspired and of the same rank as the other Old Testament books. Her attitude is based upon the following facts:

1) The Apostles and New Testament writers quoted principally the Septuagint. In fact, of the three hundred and fifty Old Testament quotations found in the New Testament, about three hundred are taken from the Septuagint.

2) Some of the New Testament writers made use of the additional books themselves, particularly of the Book of Wisdom, which seems to have been St. Paul's favorite volume. The Epistle of St. James - to take another example - shows an acquaintance with the Book of Ecclesiasticus. If the Apostles and New Testament writers used some of the additional books, did they not thereby approve the entire Septuagint collection?

3) The additional books were accepted in the Church from the beginning. The Epistle of Pope Clement, written before the end of the first century, makes use of Ecclesiasticus and Wisdom, gives an analysis of the book of Judith, and quotes from the additional sections of the book of Esther. The same is true of other early Christian writers.

4) The oldest Christian Bibles in existence (Codex Vaticanus, etc.) contain the additional books intermingled with the rest, just as we find them in the Catholic Bibles today.

5) The oldest Christian lists of Biblical books contain the additional books. In 382 Pope Damasus in a Roman Council issued a formal list of Old and New Testament books and the list contains the same books as we have in our Bibles.

6) Finally, Christian art of the first four centuries - especially that found in the catacombs and cemeteries - furnishes among others the following illustrations from the additional books: Tobias with the fish (Tobias 6), Susanna (Daniel 13), Daniel and the dragon (Daniel 14), the angel with the three children in the fiery furnace (Daniel 3:49), Habacuc and Daniel in the lion's den (Daniel 14:35).

The Protestants often designate as "apocryphal" those seven books and those sections which their Bibles omit from the Old Testament. The Catholics object to this title. These books are regarded by the Church as inspired. They formed a part of the Bible of united Christendom before the Protestant revolt, and Christian antiquity was practically unanimous in regarding them as of divine origin.

The Protestant New Testament contains the same books as the Catholic New Testament. Although Luther showed great hostility to St. James's Epistle because of its doctrine of the necessity of good works and contemptuously called it an "epistle of straw," he clearly saw that he had no more reason for excluding that book than he had for rejecting the other books of the New Testament. The differences between the Protestant and Catholic New Testament arise from changes in specific passages in various books of the New Testament.

In the passage from I Corinthians 11:27, "Whosoever shall eat this bread OR drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord," the Authorized Version (AV) of King James replaced "or" by "and." Inspired by doctrinal and anti-Catholic bias, the editors purposely changed the text in order to remove the argument for communion under one kind. Today all Scriptural scholars agree that "OR drink the chalice" is the correct reading. Modern critical Protestant editions of the Bible - the Revised Version and the Standard Version - have rejected the reading of the Authorized Version and restored the old or Rheims-Douay reading.

A further deliberate change in the interest of the Protestant doctrine on original sin is introduced into several passages. The Reformers, as we know, maintained that human nature was essentially corrupted by the Fall. Man's intellect is positively darkened and his free will destroyed.

In I Corinthians 7:9 where the Rheims-Douay Version reads: "If they do not contain themselves, let them marry"; the Authorized Version changed the passage to read: "But if they cannot contain, let them marry." The same Authorized Version changes "do not" to "cannot do" in Galatians 5:17: "For the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh; for these are contrary to one another, so that you do not the things that you would." The aim of the editors in both instances was to introduce into the Scriptures the false Lutheran doctrine concerning the total depravity of human nature because of original sin. St. Paul is made to affirm that a Christian cannot lead a stainless virtuous life. The critical editions of the bible, however - the Revised and Standard Versions-refused to adopt this reading and returned to the reading of the Rheims-Douay.

From all my research there are only a few translations of the Holy Bible that remain true to the teachings of the Church. Most other translations are not accurate, or have knuckled under to the pressures of a liberal world in using gender inclusive language or substituted entire phrases or specific words that may in some way indicate exclusivity. I plan on getting a Douay-Rheims and and Ignatius Bible. Below is a list of those that retain the accuracy of God's Holy Word and teachings from the foundations of the early church:

The Authorized King James Bible (The 1610 version only)
The Douay-Rheims
The New American Bible (NAB)
The Ignatius Bible

The "real" Church

2009-11-17T21:34:00.010-05:00

Every now and then I've been asked if I believe the Catholic Church is the "one TRUE" Church and all the others are not. Usually it's a Protestant asking me this and I know they already have their backs up waiting for my answer....mainly because they know what my answer will be as a Catholic. I've always cringed when I get what I call "cornered" with those questions. I feel cornered because I won't side step or fudge an answer but will tell the truth straight out that I honestly believe that it -is- the original true church built upon the foundational rock of St. Peter as spoken of by the very lips of Jesus Himself. Peter then appointed his successor and so on and so forth until this very day. The Protestant believer then assumes that I think they are not "saved" and are going to hell. That always seems like a really HUGE jump for me. Not only can I not see the condition of their hearts, it isn't my place to try to ascertain the authenticity of their salvation. If their lives are bearing the good fruit spoken of in the Scriptures in both personal and public ways after having come to a salvation experience with Christ...well that rather speaks for itself I should think. God says that we become a new creation in Christ and that we will be known as His by our fruit. The old us, the old ways will pass away and behold...a new person with a new spirit and new roots has emerged after having been grafted into the vine.

For some reason however, people seem to want take so much offense to the very idea that the Catholic Church is the first, the true, the original...the real McCoy. I used to be Protestant...a hard core evangelical one at that so I know all the reasons why they honestly believe that we "Romans" are the being led astray into the pits of hell, are idol worshipers who pray to dead human beings which in their eyes is the same as mediumship and soon and so forth yadda yadda yadda. Believe me, I know. I used to be one. I used to believe all the same things for all the same reasons. I had all the Bible verses ready to quote in any Catholic who challenged me and then told them what those passages meant. Of course, I never bothered to find out from a learned Catholic what they believed or why. I always accepted that my own protestant teachers would provide me with the truth of that and also spoon feed me the truth of Scripture meanings too. Then when I went to the Word and read those same passages I was already predisposed to seeing what I was taught to see. That can be said for anything, in all fairness. You see what you are taught to see by those who got there first. But for some reason I grew hungry....for holiness.

You see....as a hard core evangelical I was all pumped up. Most Evangelical groups are extremely political by nature in that they have a strong sense of self, of group identity, and shared purpose. They keep the emotion levels high. Onward Christian soldiers! CHARGE!!!! Everything is centered around spiritual warfare. If anything goes wrong, or something bad happens to someone in the group...it's an attack by Satan! I'm not saying that this isn't sometimes the case but any opposition...even by their brothers and sisters in Christ who are not Evangelicals...is automatically defined as a Satanic assault because of all the ground they are taking for Christ. They must be doing -something- right or they would not be experiencing this "attack" against their (insert: health, wealth, spiritual assumptions, interpretations of Scripture, etc). I used to believe all of that hook line and sinker. It made absolute sense. This was war!

What happened was that I learned too much. In my zeal, I wanted to learn what Catholics said of their teachings and beliefs themselves. Better information to counter them with and show them the error or their ways...or so I thought. Big mistake. Well, not mistake...but big blow to my nice evangelical bubble of misinformation and misinterpretation. The more I learned about what they believed and why they believed it....the more I took that to prayer...the more hollow and shallow my life as an Evangelical became. Soon the emotional hype of a rip roaring praise and worship service didn't seem to have the effect it once did. The shouting, jumping and general loudness seemed to drown out the silent sweet strains of holiness I craved. The Wednesday night meetings, the in home Bible studies...all seemed to center around our being in a spiritual battle, a war with Satan and unbelief. While that is still true, I started to wonder, if we are in this terrible struggle, why aren't we spending more time in adoration and supplication before God then in hyping ourselves up to go to battle ourselves. I was beginning to see it as a group of people holding tight to each other rather than holding tight to God together. They would give themselves pep talks and pep rallies and call that praise and worship. They would study the Word with the focus on its use as a sword forgetting its many other uses as well. It was too lop-sided. Top heavy. Once the emotion starts to pitter out, there's not a whole lot left. I think that's part of the reason why they stay in such tightly nit groups all the time. They need to keep each other pepped up. The Evangelical salt rarely leaves the shaker and when it does it leaves in small packets or mini-groups to maintain that high emotional energy level. That's when the tide started turning for me. I didn't want a faith that needed a steady jolt of emotional caffeine to keep going. I wanted one that would still be there even if my emotions said otherwise. The more I studied about the Catholic Faith, the more I realized that they were actually more fundamental than the so-called Fundamentalists!

I have the honor to know and love some really wonderful Evangelical brothers and sisters whose enduring faith is an example to everyone. I know some Catholics who could learn from them what it means to stand fast, stand bold. That's something a lot of us Catholics don't' do as well. We have a tendency to try not to make many waves if it will cause discomfort. Those who do stand up and stand out are applauded because we see it as so brave. We all need to be more like our Evangelical brothers and sisters in our willingness to stand firm in even the small everyday things like praying before our meals in a restaurant regardless of how it "looks" to others. That's where the Evangelicals shine.

I still hate being asked if I think the Catholic Church is the "true" church. My best answer at this point is that the TRUE church is the one made up of ALL those who have become new creations through the salvation of their souls. If you have received your salvation, if it has made of you a new creation and if that bears testimony in the good fruit of your life both privately and publicly...then -you- are already part of His "true" church.

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]" src="http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=7efbf326-92df-4612-8ac2-63c32b0284b7">

Time Flies

2009-11-17T16:46:00.004-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

It's hard to wrap my head around the fact that it's almost time for Thanksgiving already. Didn't November just start? Did I sleep through a major section of it somehow? November, December and January are so filled with holidays, activity and rushing around that they speed by in a blur and I'm usually left breathless and exhausted at the end.

Over the past few years or so we've been cutting way back on holiday activities. Some people love the rush, the bustle, the million and one things that need to be done by this or that deadline. My husband and I find it stressful. Luckily we're on the same page in how we view and react to all the demands on time and finances the holidays always bring with them. As commercialism has grown ever larger and more intwined with the whole holiday "vibe" our enjoyment of them has dwindled in kind. We live on a very tight budget so we are always left feeling totally inadequate in the gift giving department. We usually by some small gift for each other and just enjoy the fact that he has some extended time off from work over Christmas week that we can spend together. We'll see a couple movies and just try to relish being able to take a deep breath that hasn't been scheduled in some time slot. We do of course, go to see our families weather permitting. Each set of parents lives about 2 hours from us....in opposite directions....so we try to see one set on one day and another on a different day. We love seeing them but we absolutely hate the drive.

I grew up poor, on a small family owned dairy farm. Christmas was hard on my parents but I don't recall as a child ever feeling as though I was lacking anything. I was never hungry, without clothing, without warmth or education. Christmas was about baking Christmas cookies (from scratch), watching holiday specials on television (black and white with rabbit ears antenna)....back when they still showed ones that had to do with the birth of Christ and not only those about red-nosed reindeers and snowmen....and decorating the house with home made paper snowflakes and chains of popcorn that were hung on the tree. We made garlands out of contruction paper (red, white and green, of course) by pasting interlinking loops together. There were a few store bought decorations as well. Christmas bulbs that were very inexpensive and made of tin. We recycled and reused the tinsel...carefully repacking it as straightly as possible in a box for the next year's use. We reused the wrapping paper as well. We had presents under the tree and it always seemed like a lot. We never knew or noticed that my parents bought almost nothing for each other so they would have money for us kids. They would buy each other things that were needed and necessary for the farm or house, carefully wrap them and then make a big fuss over them to each other as we all unwrapped gifts on Christmas morning. Even though they still had to tend the animals, milk the cows and clean the barn on Christmas day, the work was done by mid morning usually and the rest of the day was spent together. We didn't spend it in the car. We spent it together in our own house, eatting, laughing, watching the parade on televsion, going to church service and just allowing ourselves to feel the deep satisfaction of being cozy and at ease.

The "Sinner's Prayer" is a False Doctrine

2009-11-12T13:56:00.006-05:00

I've been checking out the available videos on places like YouTube and Illbehonest.com of preacher Paul Washer. I have to say that his zeal for the truth, for a moving away from what I call "fast food Christianity" moves and inspires me. He can be abrasive at times but most of what he says just hits home. I highly recommend doing a search for videos on YouTube by this man. You may not always agree with every point he makes (I myself, am not a supporter of Calvanism) but I can bet you'll be given some real food for thought. I especially agree with the point he makes about the wrongness of the "sinner's prayer" teaching that is so common in most evangelical ministries.

Saved FROM the Sinner's Prayer

Saved from the Sinner's Prayer from I'll Be Honest on Vimeo.

"If they could see what was happening...they'd run out of there..."

2009-11-10T12:09:00.001-05:00

2009-11-09T05:57:00.004-05:00

Here is another video from GodTube, now called Tangle. It is not fluff. While I don't believe in the faith alone doctrine, this Southern Baptist preacher really hits the nail on the head about American Christianity. It's a little over 47 minutes so get comfy but please...do watch and listen with an open heart. Below the video is the blurb written by the person who uploaded it to the Tangle site. It's in two parts. He was kicked out after this and not invited back to speak again.

"This is a Shockingly Powerful & Biblical message preached to about 5,000 youth in a day when youth are appealed to through shallow and worldly means. At one point in this sermon the 5,000 Youth are clapping and yelling BUT THEN the preacher makes a comment that CHANGES THE WHOLE ATMOSPHERE TO WHERE YOU COULD HAVE HEARD A PIN DROP... As you can imagine, the preacher was never invited back. We believe the whole sermon will be a blessing to many souls. Note: HeartCry Missionary Society offers a DVD of this message. Contact them at: aglass@heartcrymissionary.com"

JUST WOW!

2009-11-07T22:44:00.008-05:00

I friend had this on his blog and I went to the site and was blown completely away. SO, I'm putting this up here too. Listen carefully to what she's saying as the tempo of her words can be quick at times. It's very powerful and the very truthful. After you listen to this one check out thier website.

Dear Satan,

I’m writing you this letter to inform you that our relationship is officially done.
You just lost one!
Cause for too long I’ve battled in my mind
Your voice v. God’s v. mine
For too long I’ve entertained the same thoughts as Cain
Like how truthfully my flesh loves to be first
How my pride tries to cover and hide so I can’t see the extent of this curse
So I’m returning all your gifts
Rejecting all your myths
See all this time I thought that I had control, but you were controlling this
Despite me doing good works in the church
Thinking I was a Christian
All the while allowed your spirit to lurk
What a deception
You went to church with me
A thwarted perception
Saying that I love God louder and louder
But had a spiritual infection
I see you’re a deceiver; you take advantage of every weak part
I could come to church every week
As long as I don’t apply the word to my heart
We were friends because I did what you wanted me to
I thought a little sin wouldn’t hurt
I mean I didn’t want to sleep with you
I just thought it would be cool to flirt
But I see you play for keeps
Now I know that the Word is true
What you sow is what you reap
I keep saying I’m so blessed, I’m so blessed
All the while secretly giving you a kiss
I remember all the places we used to go
Now inwardly it makes me sick
Like how you talked me into going to the club
At first I really didn’t want to go
I thought it wouldn’t affect me
But while I was there my lust began to flare and I got hot and heavy
Started thinking about the dudes in the room
Wanting to ride off in their Chevy
Or the comedy spots where we sat and laughed enjoying ourselves all night
When they were joking and mocking the church like that situation is light
And explicit sexual content echoed through that mic
And I laughed like it was alright
Now I know God wasn’t laughing
Even though you and I was on a roll
I see it was because my heart was so numb and cold
In the back of my mind
I thought I’d really give God 100% when I’m old
Once I’m done having my fun
Then I thought what if I don’t make it past 25, then what?
What did I live for?
I just can’t ignore anymore this proposal from the Lord
So I changed my number so you would no longer call
And I would no longer fall
But even though I did all that you still controlled me from afar
Because I was just trying to be a better person
Stopped clubbing, stopped sex, stopped cursing
Dropped friends, cause of greed stopped working
But stopping things don’t rid the seed of the serpent
It was all self-righteousness
A righteousness I created
It’s like using filthy rags to take a bath
When the truth is my entire sin nature is bad
And me stopping those things never dealt with the wickedness of my heart
If I thought someone did me wrong
I was so quick to lash back, all the while singing a praise song
Even though the Bible says repay not evil for evil, I refused to believe
And your strings got me doing things that I can’t even help
Trying to love my brother but always thinking about myself
What a curse
Like I could run up and hug someone at church
But because inwardly I wanted to be first
Didn’t realize it but I was wishing them the worst
Although the outside was clean
The inside of the cup was filthy and mean
So I wrestled with the conclusion
Maybe I’ve been excluded from being able to live this Christian life
But then that sounds like your voice
You’ve influenced so much of my life
Those events help me see how powerless I am
And the reality is there is only one way
And before I was set free, I had to realize I was a slave
I have no merit, virtue or favor with God
It’s Christ’ poured out lifeblood that saves
And I’m sick of it, my sin
I’ve defended it, time and time again
Dead in my transgression but now I’ve come on out of the grave
Because this new relationship is based solely by grace through faith
And my life is a result of what I believe
Since you shall know a tree by the root and the fruit
So rather than just dress modestly, I’m checking my heart too
Making sure there is no vanity
Or that I’m dressing to grab the attention of humanity
Because I know what I can do, if I remain in a relationship with you
My potential outside of Christ is extremely detrimental
So I’m clinging on with all I’ve got
So now when I think of all the movies we went to
Man I get so hot
Cause Christ has won my heart
I can’t sit there and glory in the violence on that screen
And even though I used to justify by saying I never hurt anyone
I was being entertained by the very thing
God choose to destroy the world for in Genesis 6
He said the earth was corrupt and filled with violence
So the only reason I wasn’t destroyed
Was God’s kindness
You see you helped me build a tower like you did with Nimrod
But I’m tearing it down for my God
By the way I’m clearing out my ipod
I’m giving you back all your music
Couldn’t see it before
This tool you were using
Different song
Different score
Brought the same conclusion
All about lust, money, self and sex
Yet those things are the reason Christ was out to death
Who you using next
Chris Brown, T-pain, souljah boy, ne-yo, Beyonce or Game?
Every artist motivation is the same
To take my heart away from the reason Christ came
I could say I’m saved all the while exalting men
Not a fanatic for Christ cause I’m a TI fan
No-one no-one, not even Alicia keys supersedes the reason Christ bleeds
No-one no-one has even ever heard Alicia sing about why Christ is grieved
And I thought her music was positive
But when I look into the word, Christ and Alicia are opposites
Christ is on my mind
So you won’t see me bobbing it
Because He’s all I need
He is all I need
Cause all that music was to glorify me
Yet the reason Christ came was to mortify me
To crucify my flesh
Not to be the Christian in Christian-Dior up in the video with Kanye West
Now I see
How he’s saying he’s Christian yet he’s exalting women, sex, and greed
And I said I was just listening to the beats
You had me so blind to the content
I was so deceived
Didn’t realized Satan disguised as I was hitting repeat
At the same time they were pushing repeat when my savior was beat
Pierced in His wrist and feet
To take away these worldly lusts these songs stir within me
So I confess
I’m no longer impressed with you whack lines
You’ll give me all your kingdoms if I bow and worship at your shrine
And I used to
But now I’m adopted into the vine
So every lie you told me
Like you being my homie
That I could rep Christ as long as we kicked it on the low key
I’m done with you and all the excuses you gave
Like living holy is a long process
But the truth is, you didn’t want me to change
I used to be a daughter of lies
You used to be my master
But now I’m at the feet of Christ with me box of alabaster
Because He redeemed me, set me free
And I will spend my time, all of eternity
Learning Him
Wiping His feet with my tears
Oh well, there will be no tears in heaven
But I will sit and give Him reverence
Because I know I’m undeserving of His love
See I’m now covered in the blood of the Son
So in case you forgot
I’m writing this letter to inform you that our relationship is officially done,

You just lost one!

The Devil is in the Details

2009-11-05T07:38:00.012-05:00

Image by Paul Graham Raven via Flickr

Have you ever heard the phrase "The Devil is in the details"? When someone says that they are talking about the tiny poisonous details, the nuances of untruth hidden inside something. It's a great phrase because of its simple truth. Most often Satan (the Devil) hides his poison in the tiniest details. It may be the way someone words something or the way he influences one person to misunderstand another. It may be a tiny untruth or half-truth carefully hidden inside an ocean of truthful things. That tiny ounce of poison in the ocean of truth is just enough to change the ocean's water from pure, clean, clear and safe to deadly. Of course, the tiny ounce of poison is so small that even though you look right at it, it's easy to over look, to not register as anything being amiss. But the damage it does to your spiritual health is undiluted by the ocean of truth in which it's placed. It's meant to cause harm, to hurt, to sway or persuade you to accept as right and safe that which is wrong and dangerous.

Human beings are great at doing that to each other.....great at using words and so on to insert tiny drops of poison in what otherwise appears to be right and true. We use it to persuade others of our rightness, or to gather a following to feed our egos or any other number of reasons. All Satan has to do is give us a nudge in that direction, whisper in our ear how justified we are in what we are saying or doing and then sit back and watch the fun. Other times he has to be a bit more subtle and lure us tiny step by tiny step onto the slippery slope where we will eventually start to slide downward and gain momentum before we catch on to what's happening.

What's the key to it all? Usually it's ego, pride or a feeling of justification. I can be just as easily tricked by those things as the next person. For me Satan most often uses justification. He knows that's my weak spot and he can play me like a fiddle there sometimes. He doesn't use the kind of justification that is ego-centric as much as he uses my tendency to side with the under dog, the person who is being ganged up on or being pushed around. I run to their defense like a mother bear with her cub. I don't like seeing people being ganged up on whether it be physically or verbally so I feel "justified" in running to their defense. So far that's not a bad thing in and of itself. But then Satan feeds my emotion of justification and I turn from defender to aggressor. Defense can be assertive and honest and still be falsely labeled as aggression. But, the aggression I speak of is the counter-attack kind. That's where I get tripped up at times. I wrongly feel justified in counter-attacking the original attackers. That's where people fall into sin. That's where I fall into sin. A counter attack is not for defense as much as it is for domination, for retribution and the like. That is the "detail" in which the Devil hides...the detail of motivation.

Christ calls His followers to be peace makers. Wow, is that hard! How, for example, do you go about being a peace maker with someone or a group of someones who don't want peace? Or....how do you walk that fine line of defending yourself or others when they are wronged in some way without slipping into counter attack mode? When does a conversation between people of opposing positions slip from being peaceful (albeit assertive) to aggressive? How can you tell the difference between the two? Some Christians hold to the idea that expressing any disagreement with each other concerning our spiritual beliefs or behavior in general is sin. Does that mean you just keep your mouth shut if you see a person abusing their position or if you disagree with how they are using or interpreting Holy Scripture? How can you have any truthful conversation in opposition to that which you feel is wrong at all if every time you have a different or opposing view you are labeled a sinner and non-peace maker by those with whom you disagree? Is it possible to have calm, respectful differences of opinion and to discuss them without it getting heated or for one side to start using Scripture to dominate the other via making them appear to be a sinner while you are the martyr? Do you see all the details that are in those questions? All the details in which the Devil hides and waits to trip us up or turn us on each other.

I continue to struggle to maintain some kind of balance on that slippery slope. I fail often but I don't give up. Becoming more Christ-like is a painful process for me. It's hard for me...and for most people I should think...to see past my sinful human nature and how it controls my actions. It's hard to have conflict with others while still maintaining a degree of spiritual maturity. We are all so easily confounded, tricked or misguided by those details. And all the while Satan sits inside those details and laughs at us all.

When Using My Posts on Your Own Sites

2009-11-04T06:18:00.003-05:00

I have been asked by several people via email or blog comment if they can use what I post on their own blogs, websites, etc.

Yes, under a few conditions.

1) If you quote me, I ask that you quote the entire sentence without clipping. I ask that because clipping can often intentially or unintentially change the tone or meaning orignally written. I want to avoid having a tone or message other than what I stated being placed in my mouth as it were.

2) Please do not use my material as your own. I would appreciate it if you would include either a link to this blog or at least a byline. It's not to gain blog readers or to increase traffic. I really don't care about all that clap trap. I simply want my words to be just that...my words.

3) If I am posting quoted material other than my own, please make sure that you include the original authors name and/or web address. It's only right and proper to do so. I try to make sure to do that myself when I post articles etc that have been written by others.

4) Don't represent my work as being about any other topic than the one I was writing about.

5) Finally, and I'm sure I really don't have to add this but I figured I'd cover all my bases just to be safe....please do not add anything or change anything in my material if you use it. Even the substitution of one word for another can drastically change the intent and tone of the written word. Correcting my typos isn't a big deal, lol. I've little doubt you'll find some. Just don't change the words I use or the order in which I use them. Also, don't insert pictures or graphics of any kind that were not used by me in my original post when you are quoting my material. That too can imply a tone or attitude I may not have had nor would approve.

I appreciate your interest in my posts and you are free to use my material only if you can respectfully abide by the above. I have no way to police that, of course. I can only make my wishes known.

Does Christian = Lemming ?

2009-11-03T19:08:00.011-05:00

The above banner reads:

Eternally Splattered
If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit. Matthew 15:14
Following Blindly for the Glory of God.

It depicts a herd of lemmings rushing towards a cliff from an old video platform game called "Lemmings". It's a spoof of an actual banner for a "Christian" guild in an online video game called World of Warcraft.

Their banner reads:

Eternity Matters
Raiding for the Glory of God
1 Cor 10:31b ...whatever you do, do everything to the glory of God

So why the spoof and what the heck does my friend mean to say with his spoof banner? Why are you posting it anyway?

I don't necessarily think my friend is blameless in the situation. I know him well and he can go over the top at times. He's a diamond in the rough and like all of us he shines at times and then has imperfections as well that dull that shine at times. He was a member of a guild called Eternity Matters within an online game called World of Warcraft. Some of my first posts in the blog were about this guild and its abuses. They call themselves a "Christian guild" and originally they were. When this guild was initially founded and during their first year or so they were a glowing example of what it means to be a servant of the Most High God. The leadership of the guild (which is basically a club) and the members were united in a common goal...to demonstrate Christian behaviors within the game world, to witness to gamers who may never otherwise be reached all the while enjoying the game play together. It was wonderful. I became a member of that guild for quite some time until this spring or summer.

Sadly, the focus of the guild began to change as the leadership and many members became more immersed in the game itself. Ministry was still important but the "game" started to get nearly equal footing in the minds and agendas of the group....especially the leaders and inner circle. The more immersed in the game play the guild (club) became the larger their membership numbers grew. Then about a year or so ago it started becoming glaringly obvious that the focus had almost entirely shifted away from their stated purpose of ministry to progress and success in game play itself instead. Now, there is nothing at all wrong with a group of like minded people gaming together and wanting to do it well. However, EM's changing focus was creating sub-groups and division within their own membership. There was the leadership and officers of the guild which became the "in" group or inner circle and then there was everyone else. Even further change happened as the inner circle group and those that were lucky enough to be affiliated with them via being family members or close friends all helped each other while the rest of the members were basically left to flounder on their own. When the guild was young, it welcomed new members...the teenage kids that played...and would help them learn to play the game, succeed with the harder game content and so on thereby being a true witness of what it means to be a servant. Later however, new members would come and quickly leave as they were basically ignored. Soon only those people that were already successful in game play were becoming new members of the guild and those who needed any help or who were just starting out stopped applying for membership as word got around that they could count on being ignored and on their own in EM. The attitude of the servant became a scant shell of itself. Instead it was replaced with an attitude of being served. Those new members that could serve the guild because they were already successful gamers were given preferential treatment. EM still kept all the outward trappings of being a Christian guild, of course. But generally they were becoming more and more the whitewashed tombs spoken of by Jesus when he exclaimed:

"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. 28In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness."
Matthew 23:27-28 NIV

That's when I and my friend began to speak up. We begged, pleaded, gave examples and tried to get them to see how far from their original purpose they had strayed. No, we didn't always word things well. Yes, there were times when we phrased things very badly indeed. The majority of the time however, was spent trying to get them to see and understand the damage they were doing both to their stated ministry and to their own membership. We were both met with open hostility, lots of twisting of words and intentions by the leadership, lots of pointing of fingers and playing the blame game in an effort to turn things back on us and so on...and on...and on. Eventually (this past spring or summer) I was kicked out of the guild for refusing to remain silent or for being a good little lemming and simply following the direction of the leadership without question. My friend has just also been kicked out today for pretty much the same reason. What's even more sad are the "embellishments" and "half quotes" the leadership uses to twist the meaning and direction of what my friend and I have said. I have caught the main leaders in out right lies but that is kept all hush hush. They have the power to censor what does and doesn't get published on the guild's website and they use that power like an artist with a brush.

I have seen this before in Christian ministries. The power of leadership begins to change the leaders. The need to be accepted helps to keep membership under control and nodding their heads in agreement with anything the leadership says and does. Of course, the leadership will support their bad behavior with Scripture...something that drives me nuts!

Let's take a look at this guilds catch phrase for example. They use 1 Cor 10:31b which says: "...whatever you do, do everything to the glory of God" to support their banner's catch phrase of: "Raiding for the Glory of God". (A "raid" is a game term which denotes a very difficult part of game play which requires a large group to accomplish.) Frankly this is a misuse of Holy Scripture in my opinion. I really hate it when people use God's Holy Word to support nonsense. God doesn't care whether you play World of Warcraft or not. God certainly doesn't care about your play style in the game aside from how you treat your fellow gamers. So, to say that you are playing the game well by doing the hardest content available to glorify God is just absurd! This "raiding for the Glory of God" stuff is a completely disrespectful use of God's Word! It is an attempt to qualify as spiritually based that which can not be qualified one way or the other on those terms! Their catch phrase used to be "Bringing the peace of God to a world at war" now it's "raiding for the Glory of God". Am I the only one that sees the glaring difference in focus?

I think it's great for a group of Christians to get together in a game they all enjoy to enjoy each other's company, help each other play the game, witness to others they may come in contact with during game play and to provide a very real support system within a gaming community for real life issues and needs. However, when it becomes a means for leadership to "rule" over the rest of the members, intimidate them, use their positions of power to feed their egos and so on...then it ceases to be a Christian community within the game world. Instead it's just another indistinguishable guild like any other.

I've been glad to be free of the drama of Eternity Matters. The game has become much less stressful. It has become fun again. I never have been the "lemming" type and the more the guild demanded that type of following, the less "Christian" it became. All that really remains in Eternity Matters are the Christian-esque trappings and a few members among the many who hold to the truth. Many of those that agree with my friend and I about the direction the guild has taken over the past year or so have either left or learned to just "play the game", stay out of any conversations that involve spiritual belief or the direction of the guild and to ignore the favoritism and such. Many of them have other characters they play that are part of other guilds instead. They will log on those when they need a break from the ego-centric leadership style or drama of what was once a Christian guild.

Here's a telling (and fully quoted) post made by the guild leader of EM on the guild website (the highlighting of key phrases are mine):

"Therigwin
Post subject: Re: Change
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 6:08 pm
Seneschal
Joined: Fri Dec 01, 2006 8:34 pm
Posts: 2113
Main Character: Therigwin

We had 11 officers, but do to real life issues, 6 of them retired back to normal guild members.

The stress and burn out I face is really when guild drama comes into play.

The core of the issue for me is that I did not have the time in Real Life and game time to prepare two good devotionals and the Sunday outreach type in game devotional was originally the brain child of Jon and Chris (founders of the guild) who are no longer playing.

The Ventrilo devotional and pray time was my brain child and that is what I wanted to focus on."

Notice how the focus ceased to be about outreach devotionals which was NOT the current guild leader's idea and is now about his own inner circle, member's only devotional?

It's a shame really. It's a hard thing to watch.

What started out with so much promise to be a real out reach to the gamers who may not have heard the salvation message has been lost to playing the game instead.

This Note Added Nov 4, 2009:

Lunas, I personally owe you an apology for wording things very badly when speaking of the new catch phrase "Raiding for the Glory of God". I did not mean to hurt your feelings and I am very sorry that I did so. I wrote about the slogan only because it demonstrated the change of focus away from ministry and towards game play even though they had been (at least until very recently) denying it any time I mentioned it. I'll be the first to admit that I don't always word things perfectly. While I still hold to the idea that "raiding" doesn't glorify God one way or the other, I certainly didn't intend to imply that you meant ill by it. Yes, I remember you with a smile and fondness. I hope all is well with you and I hope you can forgive my lack of finesse and for hurting your feelings. Much love, Rachel M.

The Double Standard

2009-11-03T05:08:00.003-05:00

Newsweek Article
Posted Friday, October 23, 2009 2:44 PM
Full Post

Barack Obama's Idea of "Government Transparency" Would Make Dick Cheney Proud
Weston Kosova

Remember when Barack Obama was running for president and he promised that, unlike secrecy-obsessed George Bush and Dick Cheney, he would insist on a “transparent” administration that wouldn’t hide information from the American people unless it was absolutely necessary?

That would have been nice. But of course it turns out it was just talk. Obama has only been president for 10 months and already he is just as casual as his predecessors about demanding secrecy for things that have no good reason to be kept secret at all.

Why, for instance, is the Obama White House fighting so hard to prevent the release of documents about who lobbied Congress to give immunity to the telephone companies that cooperated with Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program?

A federal court concluded that there is no reason for the administration to keep that information from the public. It’s not classified. There aren’t precious national security secrets at stake. It’s a list of names of those who spent money to influence our elected officials into voting their way on the passage of a law.

The names on that list might somehow turn out to be politically embarrassing to some members of Congress, or even to some members of the Obama administration—remember, as a Senator Obama voted in favor of giving telecom companies immunity from prosecution. But embarrassment shouldn’t be a good enough reason to keep something secret, especially not in Obama’s new promised land of transparency.

Yet the administration has refused to obey the court’s order. First the White House asked for a 60-day delay. The court knocked that down. Then they tried for a 30-day delay. Again, the court said no. So they then filed an emergency motion to prevent the release of the documents. Once more, the court turned them away.

But this week, after administration lawyers tried yet again, the court finally caved and agreed to postpone the order to make the documents public.

A proud day for democracy. High fives all around at the White House.

Eventually, we’ll find out what’s going on here. Or, maybe we won’t. Cheney pulled all kinds of tricks like these to forever keep secret the names of the big oil lobbyists experts who dictated the outcome he consulted on his energy task force.

Back then, of course, Democrats were outraged that the Bush White House would try to hide that information from the public. One of the angriest was Rahm Emanuel, then a congressman and now Obama’s chief of staff.

“The vice president’s willingness to ignore the rules remains just as strong as ever,” Emanuel fumed. “Democrats are prepared to hold the vice president accountable and ensure that no one in our government is above the law.”
So why isn’t Rahm just as furious at his own boss, seeing how he is doing the same thing?

Spring Ahead - Fall Back

2009-11-01T01:43:00.006-04:00

Image by jamelah via Flickr

Tonight is when we change our clocks. We practice "daylight saving time" where I live so each spring we set the clock ahead one hour and moan and groan about the loss of that hour of sleep. Then each fall we turn the clock back one hour and smile knowing we get to sleep one extra hour that night. Tonight's the night we set the clocks back and gain that extra hour of sleep.

It's also the first day of November. October flew by in a flurry of rain, leaves and wind. Temperatures dropped like stones in a still pond and the furnace started chugging away at keeping our little house warm. For me November marks the start of winter. I don't go by the calender but by my bones. Yep, my bones tell me when winter starts and they have been telling me that I should start seriously preparing for bone aching cold weather. I really hate winter. I hate being cold and I start being cold in mid-autumn and stay that way until June. The snow is beautiful.....for a couple weeks....then it gets old. Every morning and every evening I bow my head in fervent prayer as I worry about my husband out there driving to and from work right smack dab in the storm belt area where snow storms reduce visibility to a few feet in front of your headlights if you're lucky and the roads turn to nondescript sheets of ice. Being basically house bound due to physical illness that forbids me to go out in the cold gets old too. For me, November is the deep breath before all heck breaks loose for a few months.

If I only had to look at winter from my window, sitting with my husband snug inside our warm house I'm sure I would think it stunningly beautiful. The snow glittering like diamond dust under the glow of the moon or nearest street lamp. The safe, cozy feeling of laying under a pile of warm blankets snuggled up with Dave as the wind and world did their worst outside. Eating comfort foods like a thick beef stew with crusty bread for dipping or baking cookies to freeze for Christmas as snow piles up outside. Those are the good things about winter to be sure. It can be so beautiful outside even when the weather is at its fiercest as long as I know my loved ones are safe inside with me in our small warm house.

I'll enjoy this next week or two...the very last gasp of Autumn. The smell of the leaves, the sound of the wind. Soon all that color will give way to the gray world of "in between". The time when it's not really Autumn any longer but not quite truly winter either. It's the time when the sky is a dull leaden gray, the rain is almost constant, the air is damp and chilled. I liken it to the time when mother nature is turning the page on one season to begin the next. Once the page is fully turned the "in between" time is over, the world stops holding it's breath and things start to have motion again.

"Paranormal Activity" - The Movie

2009-10-31T00:48:00.005-04:00

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

My husband and I went out for a date night Friday night and saw the movie "Paranormal Activity". Just WOW! If you like a good old fashioned scary movie then this is the one to see. No blood and gore. No over-the-top pyrotechnics or special effects. No high profile actors and actresses to grab your attention away from what is really going on in the movie itself. No weird looking monsters, ghosts or ghouls. No zombies or vampires or any of that crapola. No no...this movie is just a really great scare fest the way they should be! If you are into a jump out of your seat, scream now and then from shock movie...this is the one for you! I loved this film! It has been a long long time since I was at a so-called scary movie where nearly everyone in the audience was screaming and/or jumping during various startling scenes. I have to admit that even I shrieked once even though I was determined not to do so. I even saw the guys jumping now and then and heard the tell-tale deep voice screaming right along with the girls in the audience. This is the kind of movie that doesn't rely on music to create tension. It doesn't have any background music whatsoever so you are never clued in to when something is about to happen. It's like you live through the events as they happen right along with the characters involved.

I give this movie a HUGE thumbs up. Go see it and be prepared to jump at least once. An independent film that should give the big budget Hollywood film makers pause.

Blog Award

2009-10-29T03:22:00.004-04:00

I was so humbled to have been given this wonderful award by Mary333 over at

http://openingthefloodgatesofmercy.blogspot.com/

Thank you so much Mary. I will display it at the bottom of my blog. It's actually the first award I've received and that it's coming from a fellow blogger and someone I respect so greatly makes it all the more special.

The Owl

2009-10-29T02:19:00.006-04:00

Image by Minette Layne via Flickr

After a short (or not so short) blog break I'm getting back in the saddle. I sometimes get what I call writer's block when I don't get enough rest or am faced with too much stress. I have a tendency to withdraw into myself a bit where it's quiet. I've done this since I can remember and it would drive my parents nuts. My mom would ask me if I was okay etc. and I usually was...I was just in a place where I was unable to communicate...a place where I just craved solitude and silence...or, if I was feeling down, a place without activity. My parents learned that I was not angry with them or about to do bad things to myself and just allowed me to have that silent time knowing that I would work through it much faster than if they tried to force me to be outgoing when I was feeling withdrawn. I am that way even now although life as an adult gives me much less freedom to actually indulge myself in inactivity and solitude as I had in my teenage years. I usually never quite work through the need of it but manage to suck it up and get on with the demands of being a wife, a home maker, a daughter, etc. All those things place their expectations and demands on me and I don't have the right or the luxury of just shrugging them off. Nor would I want to do so...well, the house work I would, lol.

I was startled by the sound of an owl hooting outside my window the other night. Now, this may not seem like such a big deal but I live in the suburbs in a trailer park. There aren't a lot of big trees, this isn't a semi-wooded area. It's a block away from shopping centers and what not. So...anyway, I heard the hooting of an owl. Being a country girl I know what an owl sounds like and in all the years that I've lived here I've never heard one. My cats even heard it because it was close and such an unusual sound they were immediately alert and looking towards the window. Now, what you need to know about me is that I am part Native-American, and part German/Gypsy, and Irish. The owl is considered a bringer of ill tidings. Every now and then I find that something happens that automatically trigger those old cultural lessons. So...when I heard that owl, I froze. I had that "deer-in-the-headlights" reaction. Once I got myself unstuck I went to the window and looked at the tree outside but saw nothing. No weird Halloween decorations on my neighbors' house that would make noise either. Yeah, I know this looks stupid and perhaps like silly superstition. My people believe that God sends messages through animals etc like the owl. So it's sometimes hard to reconcile what is pish-tosh and what isn't. What makes it harder is that I am proud of my heritages, of my cultural roots and the richness of them. I'm not actually living in fear every moment of every day over this owl thing...but I take it as a warning to be prepared or to at least pray about those things I cannot see that may be setting up in such a way as to bring about ill tidings. If that is the case, then would it not actually be God's way of sending a message just as some of my people believe? Wouldn't God use those things that would speak to a given people in ways they can understand and readily embrace? I mean God used a donkey...even actually gave it speech. God used the symbology of the dove to represent the Holy Spirit. He used inanimate things like a rainbow, the stars etc as well....even after Christ's arrival. And...since He is the same yesterday, today and forever...would He not still continue to use those things to speak to people even today? I don't see the owl itself as bringing bad luck. I don't even see the supposed ill tidings as being written in stone like it were some sort of divination-like claptrap. I see it as a warning that something is amiss and could bring negative results. If I were to get that through a "spiritual" dream, or through a "word of knowledge" most Christians would find it much easier to accept. But, because it's in the manner of cultural symbols which have meaning to me based on my cultural heritage, and of which they have no understanding beside the garbage painted by Hollywood, they tend to label it as "superstition".

It's weird living in my skin, I must admit. I question so much....too much perhaps.

Scary scary scary

2009-10-23T19:08:00.003-04:00

Who picks up the tab for health reform?
Insurance companies stand to lose; doctors look like winners
BusinessWeek.com

The odds are shifting in favor of health-care reform legislation making it through Congress this year, to the point where bookies could put money on the ultimate winners and losers. Many details have yet to be determined, as congressional leaders try to merge two Senate and three House proposals, all of them more than 1,000 pages long.

And beyond the contentious battle over the public insurance option, there's a huge fight over another question: Who will pay to cover the uninsured? It's safe to say doctors will give up the least, pharmaceutical and medical device makers will fall somewhere in the middle, and insurers will be the big losers.

Then there's the taxpayer. Senate Democrats want to levy a 40 percent excise tax on so-called Cadillac plans, policies that cost more than $21,000 a year. Backers say the tax would bring in $215 billion, but unions are determined to block it, arguing that middle-income workers will get hit with the tax as well.

A fierce battle will erupt over the levy when the Senate and the House begin to work on the final bill. Meanwhile, the 85 percent of citizens with insurance of any kind, Cadillac or Hyundai, should probably assume that most costs levied on other parties to health reform will be passed along to them through higher premiums.

Most Washington observers now think the final bill will closely resemble the Senate Finance Committee proposal because it has a smidgen of bipartisan support, thanks to Senator Olympia Snowe, R-Maine. It also meets President Barack Obama's demands that a reform package cannot add to the federal deficit and the tab should come in at around $900 billion over 10 years. With billions in potential profits or lost benefits at stake, lobbyists are scrambling to make sure that someone else—anyone else—foots the bill.
"Figuring out how to pay for this package remains the hardest thing," warns Andy Laperriere, a Washington policy analyst with institutional broker ISI Group. Nevertheless, it is possible to envision which groups will have to pony up:

Health insurers

The insurance industry has been actively involved in efforts to craft a health-care bill ever since President Obama took office. Insurers have already agreed to several concessions on the assumption that they will gain 30 million or so new customers from the ranks of the uninsured. Those efforts haven't paid off the way they'd hoped. "The bill has certainly taken a turn for the worse for the [insurers]," says Rick Weissenstein, an analyst with Washington Research Group.

Lawmakers have proposed that the industry pay the government flat fees worth $67 billion over the next decade—an idea that's likely to get backing from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. Throw in the $100 billion-plus that both chambers aim to get by cutting subsidies for Medicare Advantage plans, and the industry may have to give up more than $200 billion. "It's totally disproportionate to our share of the health-care expenditures," says Karen Ignagni, president of America's Health Insurance Plans, the industry lobby.

She argues that the industry will have no choice but to raise customers' premiums to fund the new fees. Moreover, a mandate requiring everyone to buy insurance or pay a fine has been so watered down that insurers won't gain enough new customers—the basis for their reform support in the first place.

On top of that, the House Judiciary Committee voted on Oct. 21 to end the industry's 60-year-old exemption from federal antitrust laws. "The insurance companies are obviously turning into the villain here," says Laperriere. "The chances are more likely that their costs will go up, not down."

Drug and medical device makers

There were hopes that covering the uninsured would mean a lot more customers for these companies as well. Consequently, drugmakers cut a deal with the White House in May to absorb $80 billion in cuts to Medicare reimbursements and fees over 10 years—a fraction of the industry's total revenues of more than $600 billion a year.

The device makers never came to the table, and that could haunt them. Although their industry brings in only one-sixth the revenues of the drug companies, the finance bill would have them absorb $40 billion in new fees, proportionally a much bigger hit.

"This is really a tax on innovation," complains Medtronic CEO William A. Hawkins, who says device makers would have to cut back on research and jobs.

Their points are gaining traction. Daniel Clifton, an analyst with Strategas Research Partners, predicts the device makers' contribution will likely be notched down to around $30 billion.

Doctors and hospitals

If there are winners in all this turmoil, it's the white coats. Never mind that doctors and hospitals are each responsible for one-third of the nation's health-care spending—far more than any other sectors—or the fact that nearly everyone acknowledges the waste in Medicare spending. Congress has proposed no major changes to the "fee-for-service" model that pays physicians for the volume of services they deliver, rather than the quality of care.
On top of that, Congress looks set to eliminate a 21 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors that is already mandated under the 1997 balanced budget law. That will cost the federal government $247 billion over the next 10 years. The move is aimed at avoiding a full-out doctor revolt just as health-care reforms are within reach, so the issue—along with the hole it will leave in the budget—has been removed from the reform bill altogether.
"Congress just does not have the stomach to take on the doctors," says John L. Sullivan, director of health-care research at investment bank Leerink Swann.

Hospitals also come out ahead. The American Hospital Association agreed last spring to absorb $150 billion in cuts over the next 10 years by instituting safety and efficiency measures, but that wasn't much of a sacrifice, says Paul H. Keckley, executive director of Deloitte Center for Health Solutions: "Every hospital is already pursuing these measures. That's why the AHA was so eager to put it on the table."

Taxpayers

The House bills propose raising $544 billion by imposing a 1 to 5.4 percent surtax on households earning an adjusted gross income of more than $350,000. Getting anything close to that amount will be difficult, however. The proposal has little support in the Senate, and even House moderates—many of whom face reelection in fiscally conservative, Republican-leaning districts—oppose it.

Already, Pelosi has hinted that the threshold might be shifted so that only individuals making over $500,000 or families earning more than $1 million get hit. That may be more politically acceptable, but it will raise a lot less money. Which means going back to someone else's well.

(Sasseen is Washington bureau chief for BusinessWeek. Arnst is a senior writer for BusinessWeek based in New York.)

Good with the Bad

2009-10-16T22:09:00.007-04:00

Image by kayakaya via Flickr

My husband will not be returning to work until at least Wednesday. He saw the doctor today and they scheduled tests to check for GERD and his gall bladder for gall stones etc. We both believe it's his gall bladder or gall stones rather than GERD due to the locale of the pain and the lack of symptoms of GERD. The hospitals must be overrun with patients right now because we can't even get the test run until November third! Needless to say neither of us is too awful thrilled with the extended wait to find out what the problem is. But there is a good side to all this. He gets to stay home for a few more days and just relax. It's so nice having him home. We get to just be lazy together and spend time leisurely. No rushing off to work in the early morning and coming home tired at night. He's not in as much pain now as long as he doesn't get overly active so we can fairly enjoy this time together.

The weather here has taken a nasty turn. There was actually white on the roof this morning! I refuse to say the "S" word yet! It's too early! I've been saying it since summer....we won't have much of an autumn this year before the [insert that nasty "S" word I refuse to say here] comes. I'll be cold until June now and I loathe being cold.

Dreams that Follow Me

2009-10-13T00:56:00.013-04:00

I've been dreaming a lot lately while I sleep. That's not unusual, really. I always dream a lot and normally remember having had at least one or two dreams a night. They are usually the normal type that we all have...adventurous or strange, being late for office or school, getting lost...that type of thing. But as of late my dreams have been...well, the only word I can come up with here to describe it is "intense". They aren't night terrors. I've had those too and suffer from them every now and then so I know the difference. No, these dreams are intense because they follow me after I wake up. They are intense also because they are directed at me, the sleeping person...as in they are speaking directly to me...the real life me...in a very direct informational way. Let me give you an example.

In these dreams there is no "scene", no "plot". It isn't occurring in any kind of context or in any particular place. There is a speaker...and there is me....and that's all. I stand there before the speaker and just listen as they talk to me about a very specific topic. They always stay on topic, they are serious minded, they are determined to get me to hear, understand, and most importantly...remember what they are saying after I wake up. Most of the time I do remember very vividly what was said but many times I only remember the underlying feeling of the speaker...the emotion or intensity of what they were saying. On those occasions I feel frantic to recall what was said and mourn the loss of the information very keenly.

The speakers are often unknown to me. While I'm inside the dream I don't know who they are but I know they are messengers of God. Once or twice it was the Blessed Mother herself! Those are the ones I wished I could recall more vividly and those are the ones I mourn the loss of when I awaken. She would tell me something. It would take a few minutes to several minutes but she would speak, I would listen and all the while feel totally freaked out that I was in the presence of "THE" Blessed Mother! I think that is what makes me lose what was being said...my astonishment at her presence. Perhaps that's why she doesn't come often...because the message has to get through and if her mere presence is going to diminish my recall of the message then someone else will come with it. Most of the time the message comes from the messengers of God...the holy angels. They didn't look anything like angels are supposed to look! That was my very first thought when this started happening. No wings, to weird glowing effects. They looked like regular people dressed in simple, regular clothes (slacks and a pullover shirt usually). They weren't astonishingly beautiful. They were just average regular guys. Yes, they were males in my "dreams". They always stood a short distance from me...maybe seven feet away....as they spoke. They weren't overly animated nor were they stony-faced. While I knew they were messengers from God while this was happening I wasn't awe struck by them as I was when I was in the presence of the Blessed Mother.

Often what they had to say was personally directed at me. It dealt with my own personal life, thoughts, etc. so I'll not be sharing that here. The exchange was very personal and meant for me and me alone. Other times, especially when Mary was the speaker, the message was much wider in scope. It encompassed the entire world! I remember a sense of urgency about the messages given by Mary even though I can't remember the details of the message itself. There was this overwhelming sense of "hurry!" about them...as if the clock was ticking and each second carried a weight about it.

There was one dream I recall. It happened several years ago and was more "normal" in that it encompassed a scene. I was held prisoner on the top floor of this very large house or castle like building. I could look out the unscreened window at the countryside below and I remember that I was very high up. The walls were stone and there was no way for me to escape by climbing out the window. The man who was holding me there came into the locked room where I was being kept. He wanted me to say something, tell him something....I can't recall what it was. I remember I told him the truth but he wouldn't believe it. He struck me. I fell to the floor. He told me there are penalties when a woman lies. But I knew I wasn't lying! I wouldn't say what he wanted to hear...what he had determined the truth really was because I knew that it was wrong. I was lying on the floor after having been struck and he was walking up to me to hurt me again or to haul me to my feet (I'm unsure which and was unsure which while it was happening) when all of a sudden the Blessed Mother herself appeared over me in a cloud. The man stopped dead in his tracks and stood frozen in place like a deer in headlights. She floated over my prone body on the floor and made this very lengthy pronouncement about me. The man heard it and was looking from Mary to me and back again. I heard it at the time but was not permitted to remember it when I woke up. It's literally like the volume of her voice is turned down when I try to remember what she said over me. While I was in the dream I heard it and was amazed in a kind of skeptical sense. She commanded the man who held me that I was not to be harmed. I got the sense that he would obey that command not because he honored Mary but because he simply had no choice. Then I woke up. I felt...embraced...by Mary upon waking. It was like being held and rocked in your mother's arms after skinning your knee as a child. It was soothing and I wanted to stay in that feeling for as long as I could. To this day I haven't been allowed to know what the Blessed Mother said in that dream.

My current dreams, as I've said, are all about urgency....about time and the ticking of the clock. There is this all encompassing feeling...like the heavens just started to collectively hold their breath in anticipation. I wish I understood these dreams better...or remembered them more clearly. Dream interpretation isn't "my thing". I'm just left with the feeling like the world is standing on the edge of a cliff, everyone is holding their breath, the clock is ticking the seconds off and it gets louder with each "tick" and that really intense feeling of urgency.

Catching Up on Blog News

2009-10-11T22:42:00.007-04:00

It's been several days since my last blog entry. This isn't the norm for me nor do I plan to make it the norm. A series of bad migraines have kept me very uninspired and in the case of the past few days...bedridden for the most part. But never fear, I'm still alive and blogging so don't give up on this one yet!

My husband had to go to the emergency room today with severe stabbing pains just below his breast bone. Needless to say I was one worried wife. Also needless to say, I let God know about it! I am not one of those people who say they never worry about things because "God is in control" etc. I can fully admit that I worry about the every day things we humans face. A husband with pain sharp enough to make him admit that a trip to the ER is definitely on that "I'll worry" list. That's not to say I don't trust God or that my faith is shabby. It says that I'm human and I have the emotions of a human being. To deny this part of ourselves under the guise of being "spiritual" is really unhealthy in my opinion.

Anyway....my husband's heart checked out A-Okay. Thank you, God. They believe he has GERD but he needs to follow up with our family doctor and get some tests to be sure. They gave him a prescription for Prilosec and instructions to avoid caffeine, aspirin products, and heavy meals. Unfortunately they also told him the pain wouldn't just go away with one pill. He's still resting as I write this since the pain keeps him from staying asleep for long. I am hoping he doesn't go to work tomorrow and he's considering not doing so. For him to even contemplate not going to work tells me that the pain is quite severe. He's one very dependable guy where it comes to work. He rarely calls off unless it's truly serious. But, in my opinion, he needs to try to catch up on his rest since he got little to none all last night and today and is likely to get little sleep tonight. If it means we have to tighten our belts financially because the paycheck will be a bit smaller then so be it. Pasta is cheap. I would appreciate prayer for him.

I'll be getting back into the swing of things blog-wise this week so check back again.

Death Penalty - Playing God

2009-10-04T01:27:00.008-04:00

I mentioned in my previous post that I don't believe in the death penalty for criminals. It was just a comment I made in passing but I wanted to expand on it today. This is one of those topics that seem to get really heated when it pops up in a conversation.

A lot of people who believe in the death penalty will give reasons such as:

1) Expense: The enormous cost to tax payers to keep inmates in jail for their entire lives. Along with this argument is the idea that these inmates get "free" food, clothing, medical treatment, education etc. and they feel this is terribly unfair. They resent having their tax dollars used to support a hardened criminal who had done horrendous things and who will spend the remainder of their lives in jail to protect the rest of society from them.

My Response: Yes, it's expensive. Yes, they are given shelter, food, clothes, medical treatment and education, etc. Yes, that money has to come from somewhere and it's taken from our tax dollars. The issue for me is if that prisoner is given a way to "earn" his or her upkeep. There are jobs that can be done by prisoners that would benefit society and help compensate for the tax dollars used for their incarceration. The institutional jail system should have these in place then the money being put into the inmate would also be given back by the inmate through labor.

2) Fairness: Many people who favor the death penalty feel that it's unfair that the criminal should be allowed to go on living after having taken or destroying the life of their victim and their families. They have the "an eye for an eye" mentality.

My Response: Jesus calls us to do good to those who have harmed or persecuted us, to pray for them. We are not supposed to retaliate in kind. Wanting to have someone put to death who has killed your child, raped you or any number of horrific things is natural. However, we are called to put away our human natures and to take on the nature of Christ. I have been the victim of violent crime and I tell you the truth....tit-for-tat brings no lasting comfort, no healing, no easing of the pain and memory of what happened. The ONLY thing that lessens these is forgiveness and surrendering of your hurt and anger to God.

There seems to me an incredible irony inherent in a society that condemns murder...then murders the murderer. Simply because the death penalty is "legal" doesn't make it morally right. It's one thing to protect oneself from an attacker and by doing so one ends up killing the attacker and quite another to take an incarcerated person who can no longer be a danger to society...bind him or her hand and foot...strap them to a table...then kill them. Again, there is a dark irony to this that has nothing to do with "punishment" and everything to do with "vengeance" or "retribution"....both of which God commands us to NOT partake in and to leave those things up to Him.

My last and perhaps most important reason for not believing in the death penalty stems from a desire to see that criminal's soul redeemed. What a thing to rejoice over if that person finds his or her salvation! Here was a person heading for hell...for eternal separation from God...a soul being gloated over by Satan...who's eyes are opened and who is redeemed by the saving grace of our Lord! Rejoice! For your brother was lost and now is found! The longer that person lives, the longer the chance they have to turn to God, to find salvation, to be snatched away from Satan's grasp! If we kill them, they are forever lost.

For me, my tax dollars pale in significance when compared to the potential of a soul to be saved.

Music - Another Prayer Crying Out in Lyrics

2009-10-02T23:25:00.005-04:00

The song I linked below is from a group called Evanescence. It's called Tourniquet. Many of my Christian friends don't like this song because it is being sung from the perspective of a girl who has just slit her wrists in a suicide attempt and is bleeding out. What many of them fail to hear is that this girl realizes the mistake she's made and is crying out to God for His mercy and His saving grace. She cries out for a second chance even while she feels she isn't worth that chance. She asks God if it's too late for her now.

While we may not be at such a dramatic point in our own lives, how familiar is this very heart cry to us? I know that there have been many times in my life when I realize that I've just made a mistake...a very BIG mistake in judgment. I know that the consequences of that error in judgment are HUGE and life altering...that they are bad...very bad. Haven't we all come to a place in our lives at some point when we cry out to God in our darkest hours, asking Him if it's too late for us after this HUGE mistake we've just made? Haven't we all known in the depths of our hearts that we really aren't "worthy" of His intervention, His mercy, His saving grace but have asked for it anyway? Isn't that what the redeeming blood of Christ is all about? Isn't that what makes the free gift of salvation so miraculous? We, in our unworthiness, covered in the dark consequences of our own choices can call out....cry out...to a loving God for Mercy and know that He -will- hear us and wash us clean.

I honestly believe that if a horrible serial killer who is about to be given the death penalty (something I don't believe in, by the way) and were to cry truthfully out to God for forgiveness and mercy....he or she -would- receive it and be welcomed into eternal life even at those last seconds. While the consequences of their life's choices may still reach their conclusion in this world...they have (as do we all) the ear of a loving God who wants to reach down and pluck us out of eternal separation from Him even at the last second if we but call out in sincerity to Him.

For me, this song demonstrates that we can call out to God even as we realize after the fact that we have made a terrible mistake and He will be faithful to hear that heart cry and rescue us. The lyrics of the song are included with the music so please read them as you listen to the tone of the music. Perhaps you'll see what I see...a soul about to be saved.

">

Denominational Hoo-Ha

2009-10-02T00:36:00.006-04:00

Image by jasoneppink via Flickr

I am a Catholic. I used to be a Charismatic Fundamentalist. I know people who are Methodists, Baptists, Episcopalians and so forth. My question is...why in the heck are Christians so preoccupied with denominational "wars"? Are we not all His followers? Are we not all brothers and sisters in Christ?

Okay, yes...our worship styles are different from each other. Our prayer styles are too more often than not. Our church services may vary from denomination to denomination. BUT! Do we not all come to them to lift up our hearts and minds in worship of God, our Father? Is He not Father to us all and is not Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior the foundational premise of all the various denominations? So why are we so hung up on pointing at the differences as though they were in some way wrong? If I make the sign of the Cross when I pray and you don't....are we not both bowing our heads in humble prayer to God? If I recite some standard formalized prayers for various situations and you don't doe that mean that your prayers or mine are unworthy or unheard by the God we both serve?

I firmly believe that God places us all where He will and for His own plans and purposes. We all make up the great Body of Christ and each part of that body is important. Where one part of the body may not be able to approach someone who is lost, another may be able to do so. It is not our place to judge the faithfulness, worthiness and so on of the many denominations that exist under the overall banner of "Christian" churches and practices. I, as a Catholic, can not and have no right to assume that my practices are in some way more worthy or more proper than those of my Methodist or Lutheran (and on and on) brothers and sisters. God alone can see the heart of those who call upon His name.

My reason for this post is that I long to see unity. I long to see that we who call ourselves "Christians" no longer concentrate more on those usually superficial differences between denominations and start embracing the "family" that we are under the Fathership of God. It's okay if my brother or sister in Christ is not a Catholic. It is the condition of their heart, their Faith in the saving Blood of Christ and their living of that Faith that matters to God...and should be the only thing that matters to me. In the same way, considering believers who are Catholic as being idol worshipers and so on is just as bad.

We all need to remember that God and God alone can judge the sincerity of a person's Faith, the condition of their heart and thereby has the ability and the right to condemn or to justify.

Introducing Jesus

2009-09-30T05:20:00.001-04:00

Furnace Too

2009-09-24T02:18:00.002-04:00

Well, I had the plumber come out and fixed our broken pipe. It was a bit expensive but not over-the-top. They also do furnaces and air conditioners too so I had the check our furnace in preparation for the nasty winter weather we get here. This just isn't my week. They found a large crack in the heat exchange which would leak carbon monoxide into the air and kill us all if it had been running. So we have to have the entire furnace replaced. That's happening Thursday morning. By the time we're through with the repairs we'll be a few thousand dollars poorer than we were three days ago...and we still haven't done the weatherizing of the outside of the house yet. But, better that than dying from poisoned air. We'll have to live even more frugally than we already do to try to recoup all this outflow of cash. The new furnace will be more cost effective than the old one so it'll eventually pay for itself. The initial outlay of funds is rough though and so close to Christmas too. Welcome to home ownership, LOL.

Jesus Take the Wheel

2009-09-23T02:47:00.007-04:00

I just got done damp mopping my living room floor. I was listening to my music and had for some reason a particular song hit me square between the eyes. I was just kinda singing along with it quietly so as not to wake my husband in the bedroom and before I knew what was happening I had made it into a singing prayer from my heart. The chorus of the song brought a lump to my throat...not of sadness exactly but one of aching need...if that makes any sense. If you don't know the song or even if you do...play it and really listen to the words. Somehow the Holy Spirit used that song, even though I've heard it plenty of times, to break something inside. It was almost as if there was a knot tied up in there that I wasn't aware of until that moment when my singing along with the words suddenly morphed into my own heart crying out the words of the chorus to God in an almost desperate fervency. I feel kind of...spent....now somehow.

Jesus Take the Wheel by Carrie Underwood. The 16th song in my play list located to the right side of this blog.

Water World in the Bathroom

2009-09-22T20:49:00.004-04:00

Image by using neighbo.com via Flickr

Every home owners nightmare happened tonight. Not the worst of the worst, mind you. The house didn't burn down or anything. A water pipe broke in our bathroom. We had to turn off the main water supply to stop the cascade of water tumbling from the pipe so we are totally without water anywhere in the house. I call the plumber first thing int he morning and then stress over how much this is going to cost us. It takes us a long long time to save the kind of money that will be handed over to the plumber. It's going to put a serious dent in that hard saved extra and just as we start worrying about Christmas gift buying, weatherproofing our trailer's roof and other money devouring things that happen over this next three months.

I stress out over finances easily. We are what you'd call lower middle class...or perhaps the working poor even depending on where the government decides to draw the line this year. It seems that line changes a lot even while the actual income of the people it represents doesn't. We live pretty much month to month. I've managed to save some extra cash that would cover us for one extra month of bills if my husband got laid off or something but that's it. We live in a mobile home (aka trailer). I bought it before we were married. With my handy man father's help I gutted it and redid the entire inside so it's actually a nice little home...not at all the tiny, dark spaces that most people think of when they picture a trailer in their minds. It's cozy warm int he winter thanks to new thermopane windows I had put in and the drywall I put up over the ugly dark paneling. The walls are all a nice bright white, the floors are wood laminate boards that look really real but are much easier to take care of than actual hard wood floors. The rooms are spacious actually. I made sure of that when I remodeled it. No, this isn't at all what most people think of when they imagine what the inside of a trailer looks like. There are newer ones on the market now that are absolutely stunning inside and could rival a fancy house's interior. We can't afford that, however. Maybe someday when we're both retired and decide to move somewhere warmer. That's what I hope for...that we'll be able to do what two old retirees often do and move down south into some nice gated retirement community, buy a nice double-wide trailer and live lazy days together. At the rate our economy is going however, I seriously doubt I'll see that dream come true. I'm nine years older than my husband and have health issues so by the time he retires at age 62 or 67 I may be as ill as my mother is now. It's entirely possible. But...like I said in an earlier post...as long as we're together, I don't care where we live. If we had to check ourselves into an assisted living home and live in an apartment there together..that would be fine with me as long as we're together.

Oh well, I'm going to try not to stress too much about the plumber bill. God always manages to provide our needs just like He promises. We may not by living high on the hog but we are warm, fed, clothed, housed and together. We are blessed.

Changing Seasons Within and Without

2009-09-21T23:59:00.006-04:00

Image via Wikipedia

I had to struggle on Sunday with the temptation to just skip Mass. I was tired and hadn't slept well. I prayed and overcame it, went to Mass and felt good about not giving in so soon after having just started to go again every week. We went out for dinner later and I also order something not very fattening and good for me too...Salmon with rice and veggies. Overall a good day for triumphing over some of the rough spots. Monday was rough as again I didn't sleep well and was starting to get overcome with my constant companion (pain). Ended up finally being able to get to sleep around 8 o'clock in the morning and slept quite late. I'll be up late tonight as well since I didn't get up until 7 pm. I'm still hurting but it's manageable right now so I'm going to get at least a little house work done while my husband sleeps. I'll get some sleep during the day and get up in the afternoon in the hopes of getting my sleep pattern back on track again. One of the little luxuries of not working outside the home and not having children to tend is that I can lay down and sleep when I feel the desire or need with little thought to anything else.

I can see the change of seasons happening fast now. It's full dark by 7:30 to 8:00 every night now and will soon be dark buy 5 pm. It's cool enough now that we could take the window air conditioner out in the bedroom. That's the coolest section of the house so it's never overly warm enough that an open window can't fix. Leaves are starting to turn slightly yellow on some of the trees and it won't be long before it's a regular visual feast of color. The autumn clouds are moving in now too. They aren't the big billowy ones of October yet but the gray dreary ones that herald cold rain and stingy sunshine. The air pressure is changing now too and the next three months will be awful in the pain department for my migraines and muscle/joint pain. I'm already having to put on a couple layers on warm socks on my feet most evenings to try to keep them from turning into ice sickles from my poor circulation and the Reynauld's. The cooler weather is such a danger to my feet even when I'm indoors. I already ended up having the heel on my right foot amputated a couple years ago from a skin ulcer that went to the bone and became infected. I was lucky to keep the foot and lower part of my leg considering my bones are weakened by osteoporosis and more easily damaged by such things. The constant swelling of my feet...even when not at the worst...makes finding warm shoes or boots that I can actually get my foot into a next to impossible challenge. I start the hunt for a pair of hard soled house boot-styled slippers in October. If I actually find a pair that fit, I'll buy at least two pairs. That would last me a few years I should think considering I don't walk. Ahhh, the joys of winter. YUK!

Of course I fully admit that winter can be such a beautiful season too. I love snow storms...as long as my husband doesn't have to go out in one. Then I worry myself silly while he drives to and from work. Snow storms are so beautiful with their huge white flakes and the bright pristine whiteness of the world after a fresh snowfall. If the night sky is cloudless with a large full moon the snow often sparkles as though it was actually made from ground diamond dust sprinkled about by winter faeries. Winter snow storms also make my little house seem so cozy and shut off from the normal bustle of the world. The snow muffles the sound of traffic and neighbors and cuts down on the visibility when looking out a window so it almost seems as though my tiny house was picked up Wizard of Oz style and deposited in some out-of-the-way location. I really love that feeling...where everything seems soft, warm, intimate and intensely private. I still believe, as I did as a child, that the first real snowfall of the winter season is magical.

Well, I need to get at least a little house work done since I slept Monday away without even doing so much as laundry. I don't feel guilty, though. I needed the sleep desperately. I'm in such a rested state now and am being wrapped in the deep sense of quietude and peace that I love so much that the house work won't feel as stressful as it usually does. Tonight I can simply move from one job to the next without feeling like I need to be in some big hurry like I usually do. That is such a huge problem for me. Internally I stress myself silly by seeing the amount of work left to do and feeling like I need to get it all done...NOW. It backfires by making me feel defeated before I even begin and I know for a fact that Satan preys on that to defeat me in every possible area of my life in which I give him place. I come by this trait somewhat honestly. My father is a hard worker to a fault. He is very exacting in his work and hates leaving a job undone when he sees one needing doing. My mother too, was a very hard worker before she became ill. She taught me as a child to value a clean home, and enforced cleaning chores from the time I was able to pick up a dish to dry or a cloth with which to dust whatever was in my reach at the time. I still fight the internal shame and stress I feel about how far I've allowed myself to slide from this standard. I was raised better than I'm living. Sure, pain and need for 12 or so hours of sleep daily can really change how able I am or how much I can do but...really...I can do better than I have been and I know it. I was never taught by word or example to be the kind of person that gives up so easily simply because something is difficult. I'm German, Irish and Native American Indian and a hard work ethic and stubborn nature is in myDNA and in my training. It's time to remember that and remember who I am and who I want to be...and to go grab that again to the best of my ability given my circumstance.

God be with you all and I'll meet you back here tomorrow.