Heirs in Hope

A Modern Conversion Story: God is Great!

2012-01-11T13:06:00.002-05:00

In the spring of 2010, I embarked on a project with a doctor, co-writing a book about the vagina. It was to be a funky self-help guide to a woman’s most misunderstood parts: The Vagina, an Owner’s Guide. Part of my remit was to garner as much anecdotal information as possible. I decided to interview prostitutes and Muslims, Catholics and lesbians.

The hookers and gay women were easy talkers. The religious women less so. But I live near Rome and run into nuns every day – what a scoop, to talk to a nun about her vagina! But the approach would be tricky. I knew of a priest through a friend, a youngish man who chatted easily at the grocer’s. Perhaps he could introduce me to an open-minded sister. One March morning, I emailed him: “Dear Father, I am writing a book about vaginas …”

And so the clash of the sacred and profane began. [continue...]

If That's All There Is

2012-01-05T10:58:00.002-05:00

I've been watching Christian movies recently, everything from VeggieTales to movies about saints to films about Our Lady's & Our Lord's apparitions (she seems to make visits with messages for the world or healing springs, etc. & He tends to make personal, individual visits). I've been watching personal stories, fiction & documentaries. My requirements have been, does the film recognize that Jesus Christ is Lord & that Christ was crucified, rose from the dead, ascended into Heaven & is with us through the comforter He promised, the Holy Spirit? They don't all enunciate that particular formula but that is the basic premise; if it is not, the film quickly degenerates into ideology & nice warm feelings.

There are many reasons I've been watching Christian movies. The 1st is that afterwards, I feel clean. My background of abuse leaves me susceptible to flashbacks & even now, I must fight the belief that I deserve to be abused. Christian movies don't trigger those negative experiences, they remind me of God's love & actual intention for me which is certainly not more of the evil things that were done to me in the past. Christian movies are another way to focus on Jesus even when my mind is woozy w/ drugs. And I'm interested in what's out there. Christian rock is the fastest growing segment of the music market. It is my hope that Christian films will soon be in a similar position. I want to live in a world that shows me good things not evil. Of course I still watch cartoons & an occasional episode of Buffy or an action or superhero film. But in general, just as I prefer to read good things, I've come to see that I prefer to watch & listen to good things. And finally, many films are like Psalms, they sing praise to God & that's my very favourite thing to do. Every so often, when a film impresses me for good or ill, I plan to write about it.

Recently I watched, A Greater Yes: The Amy Newhouse Story on Netflix. I am happily impressed at the Christian films I can stream or order on Netflix. A Greater Yes is the depiction of Amy Newhouse's response to cancer. At 16, she is clearly God's child, she belongs to Him & has a strong sense of a mission to touch the lives of others for Christ. The Movieguide review says, in part:

The movie A GREATER YES has its heart in the right place. The message is compelling, the emotion strong, and it’s a story that no parent can watch without being moved. The role of Amy is played well, though most of the supporting cast is a bit weak.

The story is very moving, but the script tells but doesn’t show the plot points. All of the scenes are characters talking with no action. Amy’s character is so perfect that she is always perky, even going through the hardest times.

What Movieguide calls perky is actually an indomitable faith in God. As she says, "God always answers my prayers." After suffering six months of grueling side affects from chemotherapy, she believes she has been healed & is ready to take on the world. Though others want her to take a break, she feels she has lived through six inactive months & can't wait another moment to extend God's love to the world. She voices her desire to have a career as a missionary & begins to do everything she can in her own community to share Christ's love. Then the cancer resurfaces, treatment is not working & she is sent home to die. At 1st she wonders why God has left her & stopped answering her prayers but then she discovers that God has been answering "No" because He has a greater yes in store for her.

My main interest in writing about this film (& others too) isn't the cinematography or any of the usual criticisms one encounters in reviews. I'm interested in the message that's portrayed in the story & I think A Greater Yes is missing something, something very important. Amy is the narrator & we come to understand her experience of God through her eyes. Ultimately, I think Amy comes to the right conclusions but she has no sense that suffering is redemptive. Her six inactive months are spent helping a young girl get through chemo, as if God knew she was strong enough to care for the child who was afraid & in need of Amy's childlike faith. Each day, she has her boyfriend invite the school outcast, Jordan, to join his group at lunch. Jordan eventually joins just to get Amy to stop asking & also joins the 6 a.m. prayer group that is praying for Amy's healing; previously, Jordan was a rebel who would not consider prayer. Amy's suffering sparks a revival of faith in a large part of TX. Even today, her story continues to touch hearts & encourage others to love Christ & to persevere. It would have been nice if the other characters were stronger, particularly her parents - I'd have loved to see them sharing their faith with their children. But even without knowing more about them, Amy is very much like St. Therese of Lisieux: she loves Jesus & when the time comes, she suffers with Him. The film doesn't make that clear, just as it fails to make it clear that Amy suffers for Christ - her suffering is a gift that will bring many to Christ just as Christ's suffering made it possible for us to become children of God. (I think Jesus knew we would forget how powerful His sacrifice was so He sends us reminders through people like Amy; it's another way we can know Christ did not leave us alone.) Finally, I wish she had understood that suffering was also God's gift to her, that God took His dear child, Amy & conformed her to His Son's image: through suffering: she died with Him & she will reign with Him. (See 2 Timothy 2:12)

If suffering only means revival, it's good but it's not much. Helping others is nice but I want more than nice. I want to love like Christ does. I want to heal like Christ does. I want to be made like Christ because that is what God made me to be & only through accepting His will for me can I fully love others; only then is suffering worth it. A person conformed to Christ's image is the most attractive person there is. He (or she) is the only person who can truly win souls to Christ because Christ has been invited to use him/her exactly as He wills.

I highly recommend A Greater Yes: The Story of Amy Newhouse. And I strongly suggest that it be watched while asking the question, is she being conformed to Christ? Though she seems not to be aware of it, she becomes so much like Him, so on fire with Christ's love, her death, so she will be with Christ face-to-face, makes perfect sense even though it is excruciating for those who love her. And though she has died, she will touch more people than the limited few she mentions. God put her in the right place to help the school outcast, put her in the right place to help another child through chemo, He has put her in the right place to show many souls the love of Christ. The God of the living still holds Amy Newhouse in the palm of His hand. She lives with & in Him & she will reign with Him. I have been graced by her story & look forward to meeting her on someday.

Post from 10 Righteous Men

2011-11-22T16:37:00.000-05:00

Please, please beg for God's help.

New Project

2011-11-18T16:33:00.000-05:00

I have been working on a new project, Ten Righteous Men. I have been praying and asking some of my friends what I could do to help our country. The blog is the answer to those prayers, at least thus far. It's based on Genesis 18: 17-33:

The LORD said, "Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, seeing that Abraham shall become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall bless themselves by him? No, for I have chosen him, that he may charge his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice; so that the LORD may bring to Abraham what he has promised him." Then the LORD said, "Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomor'rah is great and their sin is very grave, I will go down to see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry which has come to me; and if not, I will know." So the men turned from there, and went toward Sodom; but Abraham still stood before the LORD. Then Abraham drew near, and said, "Wilt thou indeed destroy the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; wilt thou then destroy the place and not spare it for the fifty righteous who are in it? Far be it from thee to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from thee! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" And the LORD said, "If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake." Abraham answered, "Behold, I have taken upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes. Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Wilt thou destroy the whole city for lack of five?" And he said, "I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there." Again he spoke to him, and said, "Suppose forty are found there." He answered, "For the sake of forty I will not do it." Then he said, "Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak. Suppose thirty are found there." He answered, "I will not do it, if I find thirty there." He said, "Behold, I have taken upon myself to speak to the Lord. Suppose twenty are found there." He answered, "For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it." Then he said, "Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak again but this once. Suppose ten are found there." He answered, "For the sake of ten I will not destroy it." And the LORD went his way, when he had finished speaking to Abraham; and Abraham returned to his place.

We are so focused on ourselves. Recently I asked several acquaintances & friends if they had experienced miracles & all had but all the miracles were personal miracles. There were no miracles of conversion, no miracles of healing others, no miracles of feeding others. All their stories of miracles focused on what God had done for each of them. Some spoke of praying for a year or more before receiving their miracles but God came through. It makes me wonder, what if we put all that prayer & desire into converting those who don't know Christ? What if we prayed & sacrificed & fasted on behalf of our brothers & sisters who suffer from attraction to persons of the same sex & ask Christ to help them carry their cross, ask Him to show us how to be Simon of Cyrene for them? What if we prayed for the healing of nations? There is so much corruption, beginning w/ our own country, & so few to come together & pray, fast & sacrifice. What if we began by praying for God to heal our nation & then focus on every nation on earth until corruption was gone?

Is God limited to giving us such things as new cars & the right job & clothing & spouses? Is this not the God who can & does do everything? He has created everything, constricted Himself into human form, lived w/ us & died to save us. He overcame death itself & rose to life again. In the early Church, there were thousands baptized everyday. There were miracles of healing, miracles of peace - personally & within nations. Why do we behave as if our God has become impotent? Why are we not praying & fasting & sacrificing miracles into existence? Particularly the miracles Christ commanded us to ask for?

These are the questions I have been asking myself & this is the reason that for the next year, I shall be devoting most of my blogging energy to Ten Righteous Men. I've always been stupid, a fool. I believe in miracles; God is absolutely real to me. So we'll see what happens in one year. I'm seeking ways to fast & sacrifice even though I'm ill. I won't be sharing most those sacrifices because such things ought not be broadcast but perhaps from time to time, I'll offer some examples. I do invite you to join me, leave comments. suggest intercessions, suggest whatever God brings to mind. In a year's time, let God find at least ten righteous men, perhaps He will spare us & perhaps we will see Him do greater works than we ever imagined. God bless.

The Issue Is Sin (Part 2)

2011-11-14T15:08:00.000-05:00

We The Whipped (Part 2)

Posted by Ann Barnhardt - November 12, AD 2011 11:02 PM MST

Jefferson, and the rest of the Founders, knew that they had a choice laid out before them. They could either revolt against tyranny or surrender to it. We are facing exactly the same choice right now, except that the tyranny that we are now facing is far, far worse than anything Jefferson and the Founders were facing. King George never tried to tax the Colonists on their mere existence, as ObamaCare does. King George never tried to force the Colonists to embrace and celebrate sexual perversion. King George never tried to force the Colonists to pay for and even participate in abortion. King George never attempted to import and establish the satanic scourge of islam in the Colonies.

We are so far past and beyond the “long train of abuses and usurpations” that the Colonists and Founders experienced and which necessitated the Revolutionary War that they aren’t even visible in the rear-view mirror. I dare say that being a Colonist in 1775 did not, by definition, break eight of the Ten Commandments or put a person is a probable state of mortal sin.

And so back to the core premise: the government can’t make you do anything. There is always an alternative, and at a certain point, the alternative of non-compliance is not only available, it is REQUIRED. Read the Declaration:

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

It is our right and our DUTY to throw off this government. It is not legitimate and does not possess the consent of the governed, and thus has NO AUTHORITY. This is not to say that this government does not have power – yes it still does have power, but it has NO AUTHORITY. At this point, the only way it can continue to operate is by means of violent coercion, namely property confiscation, imprisonment and execution. This is YOUR country: thieving, murdering criminals running utterly amok, holding their power only through violent coercion and the threat of violent coercion. And it could all be brought to a screeching halt tomorrow if We The People would just turn that intellectual corner and realize that the unjust laws of an illegitimate government need not and should not be followed. They have no power over us. We have power over them, because they derive their JUST powers from the consent of the governed. Withdraw the consent, and the power is gone. Anything remaining is therefore, by definition, UNJUST, and thus must be “abolished” and “thrown off”, to use Jefferson’s words.

Of course you can own and carry a gun. You have the God-given right to your life, and the right to protect yourself, your family and your property. No one can ever, ever take that right away from you except YOU. The state can pass as many laws as it wants banning gun ownership and bearing, but every single one of those laws is illegitimate, and thus should not be followed.

How can the government force you to accept Sharia law, or any evil satanic system? Only YOU decide what you do or do not accept. Obama could write an Executive Order tomorrow declaring that the musloid screech to prayer be blasted from loudspeakers in every city and town five times per day, and the only true use or value that Executive Order would have is as toilet paper. Obama can’t make you accept Sharia law any more than he can make you fly like Superman.

ObamaCare can only force you out of business if you COMPLY with it. The government can only force you into mortal sin if you COMPLY and CONSENT. Obama can mandate that we all buy health insurance, and that all insurance policies cover abortion and contraception. And we can all laugh in his face. His fat wife can further mandate that we all eat celery sticks and tofu on Mondays and Thursdays, and we can likewise laugh in her painted-up-thicker-than-a-tranny face. These people have no power over us. They are slack-jawed, carney-trash gutter filth, and nothing more. Any power they have over us is power that we must specifically consent to give to them. I withdraw my consent. You got a problem with that, Barry? Molon labe.

Finally, back to the theological aspect of all of this, because that’s how I roll up in here. Look at a Crucifix. What you are seeing in a Crucifix is the stark horror of your own freedom and personal sovereignty. You are free to choose, as is every single being made in the image of God. We are so free that God consents to allowing us to choose to torture and kill Him. Oh, yes, we always, always have a choice. And now, because we have allowed it, the choice now stands as this: Either choose to spare yourself the wrath of an evil, illegitimate government or choose to scourge and crucify Christ. Pick up the flagellum and lean into Him. Skin Him. Make Him bleed and shake in pain. Then pick up that hammer and those nails and drive them in. Feel the bones in His feet and ankles crunch as you pound that nail in. And as you’re doing this, look Him in the eye with a big sh**-eating grin on your face. Tell Him how you have no choice, because it’s either this, or you might lose your job, or your 4000 square foot house. And that’s not even a contest, right? I mean, who WOULDN’T torture and kill their best friend, brother, father, spouse, creator and savior in order to stay in the good graces of the IRS and keep a job or a pension income?

The choice is yours. It always has been and always will be. This life will only last for a few more decades at most. What comes after that is eternal. Choose wisely.

The Issue Is Sin (Part 1)

2011-11-14T15:04:00.002-05:00

We The Whipped (Part 1)
Posted by Ann Barnhardt - November 12, AD 2011 11:02 PM MST (http://barnhardt.biz/)

I continue to be amazed at how many people in this culture, and most especially those on the “right”, seem to have completely and totally psychologically surrendered to the government. These are the phrases I keep hearing:

“The government makes us pay for abortions. We can’t be held responsible for something we are forced to do.”
“I can’t imagine what life will be like if they make us accept Sharia law.”
“ObamaCare is going to force me out of business.”
“I live in Chicago. They won’t let us have guns here.”
“If I want to keep my job, I have to go along with the diversity training crap.”
“I have to keep paying taxes. It’s all tied directly into my bank account. I have no choice.”

I think that people in this culture actually ENJOY being whipped by the government, because it allows them to delude themselves into believing that they bear no responsibility for anything beyond not burning the toast and making certain that the TiVo is set to record the big game. Given this truly effeminate and childish psychological orientation, it is little wonder that the following sentence – seven little words – strikes fear in the hearts of men and causes them to lash out in hatred and eventually violence:

The government can’t make you do anything.

Oh, the implications. The horrific, horrific implications. Actually, it’s even worse than that. NO ONE can make you do anything. Your employer can’t make you do anything. You can either attend the pro-homosexual, pro-musloid diversity seminar or QUIT YOUR JOB. Your wife can’t make you do anything. Your children can’t make you do anything. You could abandon them tomorrow if you so chose, which is exactly what 90+ percent of black men in the inner-cities have freely chosen to do.

And finally, the ultimate terror. While God COULD force you to do something, because He loves you, He will never, ever force you to do ANYTHING.

As much as you don’t want to believe it, as much as you want to fight it, deny it, and reject it, the inescapable truth of the matter is that you, along with every other human being, are a FREE, SOVEREIGN INDIVIDUAL.

Do I have to pay taxes? Of course not. What are the alternatives? Government confiscation of my assets would be the first alternative. Well, this would simply put me in solidarity with the MF Global customers who have also had their assets confiscated. So be it. The next step would be imprisonment. Fine. So be it. I acknowledge in truth that this is, in fact, the alternative. I do not lie to myself and tell myself that there is NO alternative. You people out there keep saying to yourself that there is NO CHOICE between the government and God because having your assets confiscated or going to prison is “impossible”, and therefore no choice exists. This is a lie. There IS a choice, and we are all being called to make that choice, here, now, in this moment.

Some people have said, “I have children. What do you expect me to do?” Well, I suppose I expect you to do exactly what Thomas Jefferson did. Jefferson wrote and signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776 when he was 33 years old. Writing and signing the Declaration made Jefferson, along with all of the signers, traitors and seditionists against King George III and the British Empire. This was a capital offense and pushed Jefferson and the rest of the Founding Fathers into the corner of either winning independence or dying at the end of a rope as a war trophy. At the time, his daughter Patsy was three years old. Not only did Jefferson sign the Declaration, he threw himself into the Revolutionary War and became Governor of Virginia. And while all of this was going on, Jefferson had five more children. Jane was born in 1774. A son was born and died within hours in 1777. Mary was born in 1778. Lucy was born in 1780 and died soon thereafter. Lucy Elizabeth was born in 1782. Jefferson’s home, Monticello, was a target of the British, and was in fact captured in 1781 by Cornwallis. Jefferson and his family managed to escape with only minutes to spare after being warned by a young Virginia militiaman. The British then destroyed everything except the main house. All of the crops, livestock and outbuildings were burned or seized.

Questions? The decadent freedom that you enjoy and are getting ready to piss away was largely made possible by a young man who was already financially established and the father of young children, pushing it all in and putting an enormous target on his own back. Heaven forbid that we should LEARN ANYTHING from history or FOLLOW THE EXAMPLE of those that came before us.

A New Experiment: What the Church Really Teaches on Socialism

2011-09-22T16:34:00.004-04:00

I don't usually link to sites such as TFP Student Action because so often they are soliciting for funds. There are certain causes I believe in supporting but many sites seem to be part of the increasing the numbers of mail in my inbox & I don't want that to happen to you. This post doesn't ask for money & provides information that every Catholic ought to know. Namely, what the Church really teaches on socialism & those ideologies that are similar to socialism (i.e. fascism). There are links to excerpts of what the Holy Fathers have said from Pius IX in Nostis et Nobiscum to Benedict XVI in Deus Caritas Est. Every Pope in-between is included because, as Blessed John XXIII said, “No Catholic could subscribe even to moderate socialism” He goes on to say:

“Pope Pius XI further emphasized the fundamental opposition between Communism and Christianity, and made it clear that no Catholic could subscribe even to moderate Socialism. The reason is that Socialism is founded on a doctrine of human society which is bounded by time and takes no account of any objective other than that of material well-being. Since, therefore, it proposes a form of social organization which aims solely at production; it places too severe a restraint on human liberty, at the same time flouting the true notion of social authority.” (Mater et Magistra, n. 34)

It always comes down to obedience. Will we be obedient to ourselves or obedient to the teaching of the Church? Will we see what is before our eyes or pretend that there is no attempt to make the America a socialist country? Whom will we obey? Whom do we follow? To whom is our allegiance? Yep, it's a matter of obedience. Click the links in the TFP article. Read all of the encyclicals noted on the page that tells us what the Popes have taught. Pray for enlightenment & to be obedient. It's hard to change, I who have changed so much know that. (I used to believe in socialism lite until I read what the Church teaches & decided to obey.) Now all Catholics in the USA, all Catholics in the world must decide whether to obey. We must become radically different people. We must become people of charity & love. We must give up believing that we can write a cheque or have taxes deducted & there ends our commitment to the poor because the state will handle everything. That is not charity. It is not obedience. That is an attempt to avoid discomfort. That is socialism, sometimes lite, sometimes totalitarian communism.

A New Experiment: My Miracle

2011-09-22T15:38:00.000-04:00

each Wednesday, I'm supposed to inject myself w/ methotrexate, a chemo therapy drug that is a treatment on it's own & a part of the chemo treatment I have every 6 - 12 months. the problem is that I forget. it is just so odd to intentionally stab myself even though it usually doesn't hurt. it's icky but it's also something I must do. except, I am somethimes 1 - 3 days late & every so often, I miss an entire week. I know it's important & that left to myself I don't do very well so this week I asked God to remind me, then I forgot about it. yesterday morning I awoke & one of the large plastic bags that have the word "chemo" in large, bright yellow letters which my pharmacy uses to hold my tiny vials of medicine was propped up against my lamp on my nightstand. it held syringes & swabs so I assume it was one of the bags from the drawer where I keep my supplies. but last month, I cleaned that drawer so that all the syringes were in one bag & all the swabs were in the box of alcohol swabs. I may have missed a bag but it would have been down at the bottom. when I opened the drawer, everything was packed tightly as it had been the previous week. perhaps, I "walked in my sleep" (it wouldn't have been walking far) but I've never walked in my sleep before while taking this medicine. in fact, it knocks me out & getting my muscles to work so I can get up for any reason, even an emergency, requires so much effort, it wakes me & even awake, I must force each movement & look like Frankenstein in an old black & white film: I am always aware when I must get up after taking my sleeping medicine. needless to say, I didn't forget to stab myself & take my medicine yesterday. and however the bag got there, I plan to simply accept it as one of those small miracles God provides & not worry about whether He woke me w/o my knowing it or sent an angel or saint (or came Himself) & placed the bag there. He reminded me. that's what I asked Him to do & that's what He did. God is very good.

Sunday Snippets

2011-09-18T00:30:00.000-04:00

The big issue this week is abortion. Partly, because I've been voluntold to assist the pro-life group at my parish but also because, as time passes, I find the issue of abortion is more & more important. As a nation, we must end abortion. Corruption is the #1 issue facing our country & abortion is the most corrupt act in which we engage. If it is acceptable to destroy babies in their mothers' wombs, then it is acceptable to commit any crime, engage in any sort of lawlessness - each of us may do anything we please. If we do not end it, abortion will destroy us.

Have a blessed Sunday.

NOTE: Please pray about the possibility of Congress using the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to make abortion illegal. It's a possibility I've only recently learned about & as I learn more, I'll post here, on my Facebook page & in my twitter feed; the latter is linked to this blog.

A Wise Young Woman, an Excellent Site & Ways to Help Keep Children Alive

2011-09-17T23:47:00.001-04:00

If you're willing to learn the painful facts about abortion, if you're willing to move from feeling abortion is wrong to participating in the fight to end abortion, watch this video:

read this site. First make ending abortion a regular subject of prayer. It needn't be anything formal: I literally plead w/ God to help us end abortion. Then speak w/ the pro-life group at your church. If you don't have such a group, begin one. Google "how do I begin a pro-life group" or "crisis pregnancy services in [insert your city/town]." You'll find a wealth of information & help.

There is so much everyone can do, from making donations to actually helping women who would otherwise choose abortion. Those of us who have never married but who long to be parents can help mothers raise their children by offering everything from financial support to mentoring to babysitting every so often so that single mothers can get out of the house. It may not seem the same but just try it. You'll soon discover the joy of helping a child to live & adults to be free from the burden of having killed their own child.

A New Experiment: Hell Loses Again

2011-09-12T23:29:00.001-04:00

This is an excruciatingly amazing recount of God's grace; of how He even reaches into the hells that others try to create for us, the hells we are convinced we can never escape & brings us into the freedom & protection of His loving & forgiving embrace. God is so very, very good!

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/abused-bishop-ready-to-forgive/story-e6frg6n6-1226133531732

Sunday Snippets: Lesser Known Catholic Mystics

2011-09-11T21:15:00.000-04:00

Physically, my health has been poor for some time (though you'd never know to look at me); I've had difficulty swallowing for months & have been on a mostly liquid diet. Spiritually, I'm experiencing an interesting time. I really don't know how to describe it. It's as if I'm on the verge of something. There's some writing I'm preparing to do that is dredging up memories, experiences, things that I once valued & thought were lost, more than I know how to express. For example, singing has always been a very important part of my life. As a child, when I first came to this country, I sat alone reading books & singing songs to God. I sang in school & church choirs & even studied opera as a young woman in New York. A life on the stage was not at all appealing to me so opera was soon ruled out but music was not; music has always been part of my prayer life. In looking through some of my writing, I was reminded that I had written a number of songs, prayers, psalms - I wanted to sing to God the music in my heart. Illness pushed music to the background but being a parishioner at an Anglican Use parish, where, week after week, we sing the Psalm in Anglican plainchant & where hymns are well-written & thoughtfully chosen has begun to reconnect me to singing as a central way to praise & pray to God. Last week, I bought myself a gift, a piano/keyboard; it arrived Thursday & a friend kindly came over yesterday & helped me set it up. I played a few chords but feel almost afraid of it. There is new music inside me, music born of my return to the Church & my deepening understanding of the gifts God has so generously bestowed upon me. It frightens me: only music or dance could express the longing, the gratitude, the love. Is it possible for a mere human to write of that love?

As a child, I found an old children's missal & hid it under my mattress along w/ a copy of The Song of Bernadette. The missal was definitely pre-Vatican II & out of date when I found it. I've been looking for online for something similar but haven't had much luck yet - all the missals I find in my price range are post-Vatican II. So I continue to look. Then today, my friend, Dawn Eden sent me a link to a post about Nellie Organ, whom I'd never encountered before. Her story touches something very deep inside me; another child who is friends w/ my Friend. I am almost envious because her life was not marred by sin as my life has been. Almost, but not quite. I will accept the life I've been given & trust my Friend to continue to be the Friend He's always been.

I have no idea what is going on or where any of it will lead. I know I will follow though, I must admit, it feels as if it is tearing me apart. I will follow. What else would I do? Where else could I go? I am like a young child riding on her Father's foot, clinging to his leg. This is where I belong, no matter where the trip takes me. This is where I am happy to be. And if I'm not particularly happy every moment, this is the only place that I have hope to become happy. And it's a great foot, big enough for many, many riders. And maybe I could work on uncovering the mysteries of the Holy Foot.

Oh yes, Dawn has a new book, My Peace I Give You, that is expected this spring. I was honoured not only to read it but to give feedback as she was engaged in writing. It promises to be a source of healing for many, many who have been abused or have abused themselves. Plan now to read it whether or not abuse has had any place in your life.

Oh yes two, it seems I'll be undergoing another round of chemo soon. Prayers for that & for everything in my life these days.

A New Experiment: Ezekiel 22

2011-09-08T16:32:00.000-04:00

This morning, I first read:

Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying, "And you, son of man, will you judge, will you judge the bloody city? Then declare to her all her abominable deeds. You shall say, Thus says the Lord GOD: A city that sheds blood in the midst of her, that her time may come, and that makes idols to defile herself! You have become guilty by the blood which you have shed, and defiled by the idols which you have made; and you have brought your day near, the appointed time of your years has come. Therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations, and a mocking to all the countries. Those who are near and those who are far from you will mock you, you infamous one, full of tumult. "Behold, the princes of Israel in you, every one according to his power, have been bent on shedding blood. Father and mother are treated with contempt in you; the sojourner suffers extortion in your midst; the fatherless and the widow are wronged in you. You have despised my holy things, and profaned my sabbaths. There are men in you who slander to shed blood, and men in you who eat upon the mountains; men commit lewdness in your midst. In you men uncover their fathers' nakedness; in you they humble women who are unclean in their impurity. One commits abomination with his neighbor's wife; another lewdly defiles his daughter-in-law; another in you defiles his sister, his father's daughter. In you men take bribes to shed blood; you take interest and increase and make gain of your neighbors by extortion; and you have forgotten me, says the Lord GOD. "Behold, therefore, I strike my hands together at the dishonest gain which you have made, and at the blood which has been in the midst of you. Can your courage endure, or can your hands be strong, in the days that I shall deal with you? I the LORD have spoken, and I will do it. I will scatter you among the nations and disperse you through the countries, and I will consume your filthiness out of you. And I shall be profaned through you in the sight of the nations; and you shall know that I am the LORD."

My eyes focused on the words, "bloody city," and I thought, 'abortion'! Then I read the New Jerome Biblical Commentary: "sheds blood: This accents the violence committed against others by the powerful, which will lead to all the other offenses listed in the following verses."

Ezekiel 22 continues at verse 23:

And the word of the LORD came to me: "Son of man, say to her, You are a land that is not cleansed, or rained upon in the day of indignation. Her princes in the midst of her are like a roaring lion tearing the prey; they have devoured human lives; they have taken treasure and precious things; they have made many widows in the midst of her. Her priests have done violence to my law and have profaned my holy things; they have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they taught the difference between the unclean and the clean, and they have disregarded my sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them. Her princes in the midst of her are like wolves tearing the prey, shedding blood, destroying lives to get dishonest gain. And her prophets have daubed for them with whitewash, seeing false visions and divining lies for them, saying, `Thus says the Lord GOD,' when the LORD has not spoken. The people of the land have practiced extortion and committed robbery; they have oppressed the poor and needy, and have extorted from the sojourner without redress. And I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before me for the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found none. Therefore I have poured out my indignation upon them; I have consumed them with the fire of my wrath; their way have I requited upon their heads, says the Lord GOD."

In our time, we tend to focus on one or two issues often because we can't take in all the information that comes our way. It's important to remember that the five Catholic non-negotiables: abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, cloning & any attempts to redefine marriage, are the minimum from the Church's social teaching to which we must assent in order to be in communion w/ the Church. But, they are not the limit of those crimes that cry out to God for vengeance. In fact, another crime that cries out to God is violence on the part of those in power against those being governed, those over whom one has power: it's as if Ezekiel 22 is a foreshadowing of the servant role that government is supposed to exercise.

At least 500 longshoremen stormed the Port of Longview about 4:30 a.m., broke out windows in the guard shack and — as longshoremen wielding baseball bats and crowbars held six guards hostage — others cut brakelines on box cars and dumped grain, according to Longview Police Chief Jim Duscha.

"We're not surprised," Duscha said. "A lot of the protesters were telling us this in only the start."

We live in a time when there have been calls for violence against members of the tea party & against those who don't agree w/ the people in power. Not long ago, the tea party was accused of using violent rhetoric. Now, those in power & those who feel they have the protection of the powerful (such as some union leaders) are calling out for violence against those who disagree w/ them.* And, some are responding to those calls (the article cited is only one instance; there are others).

Perhaps they don't know that their sins cry out to God. Natural law precludes taking a few men hostage while vandalizing & destroying the property of those with whom one disagrees. Perhaps they don't have any understanding of natural law. Perhaps they don't know the difference between right & wrong. We ought not be surprised, if one can kill a baby in his mother's womb, then it's easy to rationalize engaging in violence against adults & private property. We must pray for those who call others to violence & for those who engage in acts of violence. We must engage in acts of penance on their behalf because they are sorely in need of a change of heart.

Things changed with Christ. We became empowered to suffer on behalf of others, just as He did. We can "stand in the breach." There are many in our country who desperately need Christ's love & peace. Please, please, please, offer up prayers & sacrifices on behalf of all who use violence against the weak: on behalf of those who have & provide abortions & on behalf of those who call out for violence & lawlessness.

* I must be honest, a fringe group of persons involved w/ the Tea Party speaks of violence. Once in awhile, I visit their blogs & remind them that violence is not to be countenanced. Others make regular visits & engage such foolish people in long debates. I salute them but haven't the energy to wage such battles regularly.

Confession, it's great for the soul!

2011-08-22T18:15:00.000-04:00

Sunday Snippets

2011-08-21T00:40:00.000-04:00

I'm participating in something called Sunday Snippets for the first time this week. Several Catholic bloggers each highlight one of their posts from the previous week & then provide links at the "host" blog. This week I'm highlighting my post on Ezekiel 12. Since I don't always update my blog on, at least, a weekly basis, I don't know if I'll always participate. We'll see what the future holds. This week, I hope you find lots of great things to read. God bless you all. I've not said it in a while but you all remain in my prayers. Have a glorious Sunday!

Thomas Aquinas's Childhood Journal (Excerpts)

2011-08-20T23:17:00.001-04:00

The high boredom factor always had me hating philosophy. But now I know, it was only the adults. I totally relate to the young Thomas Aquinas & feel absolutely no desire to edit him down to 15 words or less.

A New Experiment: Ez 13 - Will you hunt down souls?

2011-08-20T12:48:00.001-04:00

In the past, I devoured the Bible & missed a great deal. I've been re-re-re...reading it for about a year or more now & am only at Ezekiel 13. Verses 17 - 23 really stood out:

"And you, son of man, set your face against the daughters of your people, who prophesy out of their own minds; prophesy against them and say, Thus says the Lord GOD: Woe to the women who sew magic bands upon all wrists, and make veils for the heads of persons of every stature, in the hunt for souls! Will you hunt down souls belonging to my people, and keep other souls alive for your profit? You have profaned me among my people for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, putting to death persons who should not die and keeping alive persons who should not live, by your lies to my people, who listen to lies. "Wherefore thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I am against your magic bands with which you hunt the souls, and I will tear them from your arms; and I will let the souls that you hunt go free like birds. Your veils also I will tear off, and deliver my people out of your hand, and they shall be no more in your hand as prey; and you shall know that I am the LORD. Because you have disheartened the righteous falsely, although I have not disheartened him, and you have encouraged the wicked, that he should not turn from his wicked way to save his life; therefore you shall no more see delusive visions nor practice divination; I will deliver my people out of your hand. Then you will know that I am the LORD."

Curious about the women who hunted the souls of men, I Googled the citation and found the following:

Satan’s Basket of Beans – “Rowland Hill began his sermon one morning by saying, ‘My friends, the other day I was going down by the street, and I saw a drove of pigs following a man. This excited my curiosity so much that I determined to follow. I did so; and, to my great surprise, I saw them follow him to the slaughter-house. I was anxious to know how this was brought about; and I said to the man, “My friend, how did you manage to induce these pigs to follow you here?” “Oh! Did you not see?” said the man. “I had a basket of beans under my arm; and I dropped a few as I came along, and so they followed me.” ‘Yes,’ said the preacher; ‘and I thought, so it is the devil has his basket of beans under his arm; and he drops them as he goes along: and what multitudes he induces to follow him to an everlasting slaughter-house! Yes, friends; and all your broad and crowded thoroughfares are strewn with the beans of the devil.’ ” –from New Encyclopedia of Prose Illustrations (page 21).

I'm still a bit curious about the practice of hunting the souls of men & the use of magic bands & veils but Rowland Hill's sermon causes me to think that whatever the anthropology of the practice, this is what Satan is doing. He wants us to be pigs following a trail of beans to a slaughter-house - scary & what we are so ready to do.

A New Experment: Ezekiel 12

2011-08-19T15:32:00.000-04:00

Every five to seven years, I read the Bible from beginning to end as if it is one book. The first time I did so, I was about five. Each evening, my foster father would gather all the kids & his wife into the living room to read Scripture, listen to a very long, convoluted sermon (having mostly to do with himself) & pray long, convoluted prayers (having mostly to do with himself). When a child learned to read, he was given a Bible. I had learned to read before my parents sent me away & couldn't wait for my turn to read aloud & get my very own Bible. It took some insistence on my part, they were most reluctant to accept that I could read, but I finally convinced them & very soon had the Bible I so desired. No one taught me the right way to read it so I just treated it like any other book. And I hadn't been taught that I ought to be able to understand everything I read so I was unfazed with & just waded my way through begats & how the many pomegranates were to be embroidered on the meeting tent & similar texts that made no sense at the time. Once in a while, I'd ask my foster mother questions (occasionally, she'd even let me read the big family Bible w/ pictures & gold edges & the wonderful leather binding fragrance). Rarely, I'd save a question for my foster father. But mostly, I just read & decided I could always read it again when I knew more.

This is my eighth 'beginning to end' reading, I think. Of course, I've studied particular books & read the Bible or heard it read nearly everyday. But there's something different reading it this way. The God of the old testament is clearly the God of the new testament. He has put up with His straying people for many, many years & they just won't follow His laws - Israel insists they must be like the surrounding nations. Then God sends prophets to warn of impending exile. None is so compelling, so dramatic, so graphic as Ezekiel as He acts out the prophecies according to God's instructions - if they won't listen, and they won't - God will send the message in dramatic form. That's from my perspective of course. I think the ruling class of Israel saw Ezekiel as a comic buffoon, but that's just my guess; they didn't believe him.

In Ezekiel 12, according to the usual formula, "[t]he word of the LORD came to me:

'Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a rebellious house, who have eyes to see, but see not, who have ears to hear, but hear not; for they are a rebellious house. Therefore, son of man, prepare for yourself an exile's baggage, and go into exile by day in their sight; you shall go like an exile from your place to another place in their sight. Perhaps they will understand, though they are a rebellious house. You shall bring out your baggage by day in their sight, as baggage for exile; and you shall go forth yourself at evening in their sight, as men do who must go into exile. Dig through the wall in their sight, and go out through it. In their sight you shall lift the baggage upon your shoulder, and carry it out in the dark; you shall cover your face, that you may not see the land; for I have made you a sign for the house of Israel.' And I did as I was commanded. I brought out my baggage by day, as baggage for exile, and in the evening I dug through the wall with my own hands; I went forth in the dark, carrying my outfit upon my shoulder in their sight.

In the morning the word of the LORD came to me: 'Son of man, has not the house of Israel, the rebellious house, said to you, `What are you doing?' Say to them, `Thus says the Lord GOD: This oracle concerns the prince in Jerusalem and all the house of Israel who are in it.' Say, `I am a sign for you: as I have done, so shall it be done to them; they shall go into exile, into captivity.' And the prince who is among them shall lift his baggage upon his shoulder in the dark, and shall go forth; he shall dig through the wall and go out through it; he shall cover his face, that he may not see the land with his eyes. And I will spread my net over him, and he shall be taken in my snare; and I will bring him to Babylon in the land of the Chalde'ans, yet he shall not see it; and he shall die there. And I will scatter toward every wind all who are round about him, his helpers and all his troops; and I will unsheathe the sword after them. And they shall know that I am the LORD, when I disperse them among the nations and scatter them through the countries. But I will let a few of them escape from the sword, from famine and pestilence, that they may confess all their abominations among the nations where they go, and may know that I am the LORD."

These verses resonate within me. I feel as if their story of exile is mine. The more I think of it, the more it seems that my homeland got it wrong, woefully wrong and I am part of the scattered remnant left alive that I may confess the abomination of the leaders of countries that focus on power & ideologies rather than teaching their citizens to be virtuous & to love & follow God.

Most Brazilians who escaped during the time of oppression were like my family, well educated & comfortably well off. And, as my family did, they went to England. But somehow things were different for me. What that difference was is shrouded in the past & I doubt I'll understand it this side of heaven. But the madness that destroyed part of my family in Brazil reached out in some way caught my parents about two years later. Except, and there is always an except because God has been made man & all things are new, before they were killed, my parents sent me to the United States of America which was constituted, as John Adams said, "only for a moral and religious people" and is "wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

So now I continue to ponder, "[b]ut I will let a few of them escape from the sword, from famine and pestilence, that they may confess all their abominations among the nations where they go, and may know that I am the LORD." I was sent here that I may know God is the Lord & I'm pretty sure the 'except' is, if I will know Him as Lord, in encountering me others will know that He is the Lord too. He is the Lord & we must be willing to become a moral & religious people. Not because we might be exiled, though that ought to be reason enough, but because He is the Lord. To be anything else is to be a "rebellious house who have eyes to see, but see not, who have ears to hear, but hear not" who reject God's gifts to us simply because we are a "rebellious house."

Experiment 8: Stories of Confession

2011-07-28T14:16:00.000-04:00

A friend of mine asked me for stories of the occasions when confession helped me grow closer to God. I have one post that mentions confession but haven't really written about it. Confession is difficult for me. I always want to confess everything, including flaws & they only want sins. And since my catechesis has been unusual, I tend to know a lot about some issues and very little about others such as confession. So here are three stories:

I used to give the back story as if I was in therapy until one day a Polish Dominican said to me, "I know you think you'll never get over all the things that were done to you when you were a child but you don't have to tell me all of that. Just tell me your sins." "You mean like a laundry list?" I replied. "Exactly." And then he added, "I'm only telling you this because I think you want a more perfect way." I thanked him & told him he was right, I do want a more perfect way. What I didn't tell him was that no one had ever taught me how to make a confession.

On another occasion when I was again confessing a sin of which I was particularly ashamed, I began to cry & said, through my tears, "But I don't want to commit this sin!" The same Polish Dominican calmly said, "Then don't." It was the first time anyone had ever told me that I decide whether or not I sin; that sin is an act of will.

Finally, when I was confessing impatience w/ occasional taxi drivers, medical office persons or pharmacy persons, an Australian priest pointed out to me that I was being impatient with my caregivers. He showed me that many, many people are caring for me & not just friends & doctors. He was so good at seeing into my failures that I thought it might be very painful to go to him for confession regularly.

All good confessors have taught me is that I have so much more to be grateful for, that I am so much more loved & so much more a participant than I imagined. They teach me to be more fully human. I actually hope my health & appointments will allow me to go to weekly confession soon.

In the comments, please let me know of experiences in confession that help you grow closer to God.

Experiment 7: Hell Doesn’t Own Me

2011-07-21T14:34:00.001-04:00

Over the past two or three months, I've had a number of conversations with friends about healing after abuse. I've learned, on the one hand, that I haven't gone as far as I think and, on the other, that I'm on the right road. Quite a lot has come from these conversations & I hope to write about most of it. It is exhausting to take the meditations in my head & heart & make them into posts but with time, it will happen. This piece is related to my posts on Catholic Witness in which I wrote quite a lot about my experience of being abused:

”Dearest Lord Jesus Christ, please heal my memory and sensibilities so I may remain aware of and live the life You have given me today. Please make my memory and sensibilities able to distinguish between experiences in my past and experiences today. If it is Your will, grant me the ability to use the memory of offenses committed against me in the past to aid in healing those who have been abused and offended as well as those who abuse and offend the little ones whom You love so dearly. And dearest, dearest Lord, please commission me as You commissioned Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta though Your dear Mother to pray and sacrifice on behalf of poor sinners. Amen”

On July 17, 1917, Our Lady showed Lucia dos Santos and Blessed Francisco and Blessed Jacinta Marto hell. Not a virtual image, not a 3-D film, not even a hologram, but really, truly hell. Lucia described Jacinta as “horrified to the point …of shriveling with fear.”(1) She goes on to say that Jacinta “frequently [] sat, meditating, on the ground or some stone, and began to exclaim, ‘Hell! Hell! How sorry I am for the souls that are going to hell! And people burn there alive, like wood in fire!’ And quivering a little, she would kneel on the ground with her hands joined and say the prayer Our Lady had taught us.”(1) She was seven years old.

Neither when I read the account in my early twenties nor since have I ever been deeply impressed by Our Lady’s actions. It never occurred to me to ask why she would show such an horrific sight to little children. Perhaps it is because I was three when I saw my Grandpére murdered, four when I was first raped, four when I was separated from my parents and learned of their murders and abandoned and left with the foster family where I was beaten, neglected, and used as an object for the fulfillment of my foster siblings sexual desires (a lot can happen in the space of a month). I had experienced hell long before I read of Our Lady showing it to three children from the country of my mother’s birth. If I felt anything at all it was that Our Lady showed hell to them for the same reason heaven had deposited me there.

When I began to ask God why He had left me in hell, I didn’t think of it as hell but as being thrown to the wolves. I had to pretend to be a wolf so as to keep myself from being torn to pieces. I even wrote a short story entitled, The Wolf-Cat, wherein a young kitten, whose pride has been killed by wolves, hides in the skin of a dead wolf so that she will be taken in by the pack and not left alone to die. She is used and abused, treated the way the wolves (in my story at least) treat their kind, until the day comes when the big Cat calls her back to herself, restores her memory and tells her that she has a mission to help Him save the wolves. It was just a story written by a young girl but, like so much literature, contained more truth than so many other subjects.

At first, I didn’t particularly care to know why God had thrown me to the wolves, didn’t care when He failed to answer. It had something to do with saving my life, that I knew. But I felt God might have made a better choice and I knew that all who had abused and offended me knew better. I didn’t know why I should care about them; they deserved to be blasted out of existence for what they had done to me and to so many others. The wolves deserved to be destroyed. As for me, all I wanted was to be back in my own skin, clean again and free from the smell and the memory and the shame. I wanted God to unmake the horrible years, to remake me. I did not want a mission to save either wolves or people like those who had abused me.

But then I realized God really had saved my life by throwing me to the wolves. There was no escaping it: in learning to fight them, I had learned to fight my own despair and desire to die & be with my parents. It was also apparent that God had trusted me to turn to Him for help and that so often, I had. Such trust must be love that wanted me not only to survive but to be happy; God wouldn't trust me unless He really know me; knew I could get the job done; knew I was worth trusting. So I could trust that God really did long for me to come to Him and belong to Him; that He really loves me. I have never been able to understand, to encompass that trust or that love. That God knew I needed to learn to fight, and especially fight myself awes me to this day. He is beyond my imaginings and I have a huge imagination. He knows me far, far better than I know myself and all I could do in response was love Him but that also meant loving His creation, particularly other people. And in my usual impulsive way, I found myself saying one day that I didn’t want anyone to be left out of what He has in store for those who will accept Him.

My friend, Fallen Sparrow , used to tell me of St. Dominic asking, “Lord, what will become of these poor sinners.” I didn’t think much of it at first. But it had a way of burrowing into my memory and even connecting with my feelings about those who had abused me. I realized St. Dominic’s poor sinners, and the souls Blessed Jacinta saw burning like wood were people God loved. When I thought about what I’d impulsively said, and talked to God about it, I knew that I must include even those who terrify me, even the wolves, even those who commit horrible acts against little children. That was difficult – to want what I didn’t want – so I asked God to make me able to love as He loves. Eventually, I began to feel badly because there were some so wicked they rejected God and all the good He has in store for them. They are extremely poor when riches abound just for the asking. The more I wanted to love God, the more I found myself praying for and loving those poor wicked souls. That was a huge gift, to love the unlovable, to look forward to seeing them in heaven and sharing a laugh with which we would tell each other, “All is forgiven!” and “I’m so glad you’re here!”

I was mostly happy and quite willing to live out the rest of my life in that fashion. Longing and praying for the salvation of the wicked and looking forward to heaven but I was somewhat dead inside. It wasn’t a subject that came up very often, particularly since I rarely dated: I pretty much kept it to myself. My sensibilities had been shattered and I expected they would remain that way. I read the catechism, followed one or two orthodox Catholic blogs, read Scripture, carefully taught myself certain limitations and worked to live within them. I also had the grace and example of friends who were also working to get to heaven and eventually, it became easier to avoid major slips and to seek reconciliation when I failed. But my sensibilities were numb. For example, friends had watched Team America and aware of my growing interest in politics, encouraged me to see it but also told me there would be a scene that would cause me to hide my eyes. When the scene appeared, I wondered what the big deal was, they were just action figures being “played” with as children “play” with action figures. I’d keep the film away from little kids but it was essentially a meaningless nothing.

But then I was scandalized by some behaviour I encountered. It was an overwhelming surprise. I automatically went into fight or flight mode, escaped as soon as possible, sought out friends who would care for me and when I made it home, was grateful for the safety of my own warm bed. The experience caused intense flashbacks that lasted for months: I was tormented by memories of being abused, and by overwhelming terror and crying fits followed by depression and sadness. Nearly a year later, the flashbacks have lessened but I still have an occasional attack. My dear friend Dawn Eden unknowingly convinced me to memorize the Anima Christi and now I hide myself in Jesus’ wounds when I am under attack – it’s a safe place to be and a place where more of my sensibilities are also being healed. I’ve never been one to wear short skirts or low cut tops but I’ve begun to find myself aware of clothing that insists on exposing just a bit more of me than I want exposed and am working on addressing such wardrobe defects and deficiencies. I even find myself looking away during explicit love scenes. The innocent child I once was is being returned to life.

After He died on the Cross, Jesus descended to the dead and preached the gospel to those who awaited His coming whether they knew it or not. Abraham, Isaac, Israel, Moses, Joshua, Judith, Ruth and so many others left the prison of death for paradise. Abuse left me convinced that I had been consigned to living in hell. I did not know it but I was waiting to be set free. And He who brought the Gospel to those imprisoned by death released me. The offer hasn’t expired but is available today and tomorrow and for all time. I am evidence that what is known as “the harrowing of hell,” in which Satan is shown that he has no power over those who die with Christ, is an eternal action. I have been burned by the flames of hell but hell cannot claim me. Freed from the flames, I am returning to life just as St. Paul promised: “[] if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him.” (Romans 6:7-8)

I no longer live with the wolves. I am a cat once again and happy to be one. But I have not forgotten my time in a wolf’s skin. At times I still feel shame, feel I deserve to be abused, feel I deserve to be in hell – fire is very attractive. But in Jesus’ wounds I remember that the flames burned me but never owned me. I belong to Christ and I never want to belong to anyone else. Jacinta Marto did not forget hell, it made her pray and sacrifice on behalf of those who did not concern themselves with their eternal futures but hastened down the road to destruction. I no longer wish to forget my experience of hell but instead seek to pray and sacrifice on behalf of those who have been abused and also on behalf of small, mean abusers. And I want to work to make the number of those hastening towards destruction as small as possible; living with Christ is also participating in His redemptive work. As my memory and sensibilities are healed, I become better able to participate in that work.

The message of Fatima is penance and reparation. That is work I can do whether I’m ill or well, weak or strong. There are so many adults and children who have survived sexual abuse and other major childhood traumas yet are still enthralled by the flames, still convinced they are in hell. They don’t yet know that their experiences were not so that they would be forever lost but rather that they might be found and bring with them many others who are, in their own way, lost. Our Lady prepared Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta for a mission to sinners. I have been prepared for a mission too: I know the way out of hell and it is my job to tell others how to reach safety. It’s not an exalted mission by any means. It mostly consists in befriending those God brings into my life, praying for those in need and most especially for victims of abuse and for those who abused them. It’s nothing terribly exciting unless being a klaxon horn is exciting. I just tell those being burned that there is a sure way out of the flames, that way is Jesus.

1 “Memórias e Cartas da Irmã Lucia” (Memories and Writings of Sister Lucia); Sr. Lucia of Fatima

Experiment 6: We Need to Have a "God Bless You" Day!

2011-07-21T14:01:00.000-04:00

This is not Houston St. in NYC. Unfortunately, it's Houston, TX. How can anyone in TX try to abridge our freedom of religion & free speech? We must do everything we can to support those bringing suit & we ought to seriously consider a God Bless You day!

Experiment 5: Response To An Email

2011-06-30T15:10:00.000-04:00

I don't check all my email accounts regularly but today, I thought I'd take a look @ my hotmail account and discovered I had received the following:

Date: Wed, 4 May 2011
Subject: What do you think?

Dear MoveOn member,

Because MoveOn is its members, our power and direction come entirely from members like you.

I'd love to hear what you're thinking right now. What do you take away from the news recently? What are you excited about? What do you want from MoveOn?

If you have any thoughts you'd be willing to share, please reply to this message or drop me an email at:

jruben@moveon.org

Thank you!

Justin

I thought I'd share my response with you:

Dear Justin,

When I registered @ MoveOn.org several years ago, I thought it was a viable organization working to help the poor in the United States. Over the past few years, I've learned that MoveOn has no real concern for those in need but rather seeks to impose on the US an ideology that is the direct opposite of everything I believe in. I believe in charity, voluntary giving to help those in need; MoveOn wants to use every area of government to redistribute wealth. Except the wealth is somehow lost in the redistributing pipes & the poor are no better off while those whose wealth has been taken away are now poorer & can't create the jobs that the poor need in order to build better lives for themselves.

MoveOn believes in bringing illegal aliens into the US to upset our way of life. Those illegal aliens aren't the desperate poor who come here for a better life; the very poor can't afford to pay the transport costs. Those you bring in are anarchistic communists. They are angry that good exists in the US. It doesn't even occur to them to fight the corruption in their own countries & develop their own good but only to come to the US to destroy the good we have built here.

Anger at the good that the US has created & helped the world create is why MoveOn exists; you welcome anarchistic communism. Many people may not recognize it but some of us do; I do. Destruction of the good will neither help the poor nor accomplish anything except death. But then, ultimately, that's what anarchistic communism wants, death. I'm so sorry you are caught up in an organization that will only lead to destruction. I truly do understand how one begins seeking to do good & then becomes so enmeshed, it's very difficult to see the truth, especially the truth about your own organization which must be very dear to you. It's extremely sad. But I'm so happy I am no longer fooled by the rhetoric MoveOn & so many other Soros supported operations spout. There are many of us who no longer believe you, who understand that you are not supporting life but only death. We will not be fooled by you again & are working to open the eyes of more & more Americans.

Please remove me from your contact list. I don't need such clutter in my inbox. Good day & may you come to see that you are not working to help those in need but to make many more poor. May God bless you & warm your heart; it must be very cold.

Drusilla

Please pray for all those involved with the organizations that George Soros has founded and pray for Mr. Soros as well. It is well worth the time to conduct a bit of research into his life. He has become a bitter old man who is bent on destroying as much as possible. He needs prayer & a total change of heart but God is well up to the job if Mr. Soros will make even the slightest gesture towards repentance. Please pray that Mr. Soros makes that gesture.

Experiment 3 (actually 4, but I forgot to # the last post): Taking God Up On His Offers

2011-06-29T18:30:00.000-04:00

We clip coupons, search out sales, order items online - engage in all sorts of activities in which we trust someone or some company to be honest & save us a bit of money or produce a quality product - to be faithful. And yet we don't seem to expect God to be faithful - we don't take Him up on His promises. How silly of us to forget the One who is really faithful & put all our trust in things which let us down over & over & cannot provide what we really need.

"if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land." (2 Chronicles 7:14)

A number of our elected representatives have asked us to pray for our nation on the 3rd of July. We know it is a wise thing to do & perhaps the most important job our representatives have, to tell us when we need to repent & pray for the gift God has given us. They ask us to spend just 3 - 5 mins to repent & ask God to heal us & our land. Please join me & thousands & thousands of others. Let's place our trust in God our Saviour & Redeemer.

https://www.frc.org/get.cfm?c=CHECKOUT&dmy=DD67F0C3-0493-820F-D591A9EB7BEFFEC5&CFID=10793580&CFTOKEN=742c50a944d43cc2-DD6792F2-0A52-7F1E-C5C1EF9B2D7C6E93

Please share the message with others. Thanks.

The Old Remedies Are the Best

2011-06-11T14:52:00.004-04:00

Prayer & fasting - it's all been explained in the past & it's time to engage in them again. The grand thing is that a leader on the national stage is calling us to repentance; finally an elected official is actually representing us. Thanks be to God.

Experiment #2: The Act of Love

2011-04-12T14:05:00.000-04:00

For various reasons, many I've written of here, as a child, I never learned many of the prayers Catholic children do. So recently, as part of my morning prayers, I've been memorizing some of them from a little booklet, My Catholic Prayer Book, which I got in the bookshop at the National Cathedral in DC. Learning them is slow, painstaking & actually physically painful so I go phrase by phrase for weeks at a time & eventually another prayer is learned. Part of the difficulty is because I find it hard to remain focused. I am easily distracted & can't stop my mind wondering off in all sorts of places. Once memorized, my mind still wanders but the distractions have come together & it seems that all the wandering while memorizing the Acts of Faith, Hope & Love was about the same thing.

Along w/ not learning most of the prayers other Catholic children did, I also didn't learn to pray as they did. I'm not sure I learned to pray as anyone learns because no human being taught me any prayers except the Our Father; I did learn a few prayers from the catechism I kept under my bed but I did that on my own. The prayers I had learned never seemed to be enough & the extemporaneous prayers my foster-father & other ministers prayed just seemed odd. So I just learned to converse w/ God or, sometimes, just to think of nothing & lie back in my Friend's arms & hang out. That basic mode of praying has never changed & my mind automatically wanders to it much of the time & especially when I am learning new prayers. So I thought I'd try to put some of those wanderings into intelligible form & share them with you.

O my God, I love You above all things, and with my whole heart and soul, because You are all good and worthy of all my love. I love my neighbour as myself for love of You. I forgive all who have injured me, and I ask pardon of all whom I have injured. Amen.

I've learned the Acts of Faith, Hope & Love. My mind wanders during all of them but it is the Act of Love I would almost totally rewrite. The 1st place my mind wanders off is because You are all good and worthy of all my love. I find myself telling God, that the truth is I love Him because He loves me 1st & how can I not love Him when He has loved me so much & so well. Then I usually find myself thinking about those who ought to have loved me & how badly they failed, of how badly I have failed to love & that makes me realize all the more how much God loves me & that I am only loving Him in response. I can remain for a long time just thinking of God's love for me even though I don't deserve it but I try to move on; usually I do.

The 2nd place of wandering is I love my neighbour as myself for love of You. Here I admit that I do not love my neighbour as myself (and usually remember to thank God for that) for love of Him. Instead, I tell God that I try to love my neighbour as Christ has loved me because He has commanded me to do so & I want to do His will. The emphasis is on try. I fail, a lot, & can only keep trying because He loves me so much & I want to love Him any way I can. Sometimes I think how much more I would fail if I was trying to love as I love myself. There is brokenness within me that makes loving myself, even for love of God, very difficult indeed: my self love is not a template for loving others. But God is brilliant. He has given even me the opportunity to learn to love my neighbours, & learn to love myself in the process, if I seek to love as He loves me. And the glorious bonus is that because I know He loved me 1st & my love for Him is in response to His love, my love for my neighbours is also because of His love for me & them. How can I not love what my Beloved loves?

Finally, my mind wanders at I forgive all who have injured me, and I ask pardon of all whom I have injured. That sentence becomes: I try to forgive all who have injured me because You have told me to do so & I try to ask pardon of all whom I have injured because I know that's what You want. I think the Act of Love ends on a wimpy note because it doesn't end w/ acknowledging God's love but this is actually a perfect place to address that omission: I can only forgive because He works forgiveness within me. That's something I learned a while back, when I felt called to forgive those who killed my family but couldn't even express the words. Finally, after several days struggling & crying, the realization lit up my heart, the ability to forgive is as much a gift as anything else & if that's what God wanted of me, He could make it happen. So I asked Him to work forgiveness within me & was granted peace & found myself praying for people I had hated just a few minutes earlier. God continues to make it possible for me to forgive even if I must, at times, wait to express forgiveness. And the same is true about asking pardon. I put all my occasions of forgiving & being forgiven in God's hands & He handles it. Ultimately, I realize I must move onto something else so I end the Act of Love by telling God I am so grateful He makes it possible for me to love Him & His creation.

And now it's time for me to move onto something else. The Act of Love has been around for a long time & I'm glad I've learned it. I do think it might be more dynamic & when I am praying it alone, I amend it to my heart's content. But when I'm praying it w/ others, I keep to the original because that's part of what love does, gives way to others over those things that are not essential. After all, anyone making an Act of Love is doing so because he loves God & that's the essential thing.

God is good. But what is man?

2011-03-05T19:40:00.000-05:00

It's been several months since my last entry. Houston & being ill require a great deal of work & are exhausting. When I originally began blogging, I thought it would take the place of my personal journal. But my posts became so infrequent, I began keeping my personal journal again: God doesn't mind if I become distracted & head off in another direction & between being ill & extremely medicated, focusing is actually painful. But today I'm trying an experiment. I want my mind to be restored to health as well as my body so perhaps an occasional post will force me to focus & will help heal my mind. (I'm also considering Tai Chi & I've found a dance partner to teach. Dance will help me regain the strength, form & balance I once had. Working with someone will help me push myself.) I must ask one favour of all of you, if I ramble or make no sense or am inconsistent, please let me know. Please help me get well. (Don't worry about my feelings, just tell me the truth.)

In my last post, I left off asking whether God can exist and not be good. There were excellent responses. Kathleen Lundquist's comment comes closest to stating my belief:

If that's the case [that God can be malevolent], then we're all in hell. The choice is between being and nothingness. If God is our Father/the ground of our being, and being is not good, then we may as well just walk off the cliff into insanity.

Even though my life has had & continues to have quite a lot of suffering, I, like many Christians, have always believed & experienced God's goodness: from an early age, I knew there was a huge difference between God & man. By that I don't mean to say that I haven't had struggles w/ God because of the suffering in my life but that ultimately, God has always used suffering to bring me closer to Himself. So how answer such a question? I could share some of my personal experience (& have been willing to do so privately) but then it hit me, if we're accepting God's existence then we must accept His goodness - God & goodness are not two separate things but one & the same thing. So I must ask those who posit God as Creator & evil, when you say you believe in God, just whom, exactly, do you believe in? If god is Moloch, then no, he is not good. Ditto all the demons & idols ever created by human beings. But if God is YHWH, then we're facing a totally different proposition because YHWH is good.

We know the story or can easily learn it by reading the Bible: YHWH, who transcends space & time, creates this world, this reality & chooses to enter into it. He creates Man & is in relationship with them. Man rebels against YHWH but YHWH doesn't leave us as a god would do. Rather, He lets us know there are serious consequences for our rebellious actions & He remains in relationship w/ those who choose to be in relationship w/ Him. Man suffers, creation groans because our rebellion has caused it to be subjected to the chaos from which we were protected. None of us is exempt, no matter how old or young, how weak or strong, no matter how much money we have nor how high our position nor how great our intelligence. We chose rebellion & only God's mercy keeps us from being utterly destroyed. But God uses suffering to prepare a people to receive Him so that YHWH can show us who He is. He finally arrives, a human baby who is also God: God literally places Himself in our hands. And we kill Him. But, though it ought to be, God's death isn't the end of the story. YHWH who has become Man returns from the dead, ascends back to be with His Father, sends us the Holy Spirit who will teach & guide us & promises to come back once we have told the entire world about Him. When that time comes, He will give those who choose to accept it something more glorious than we can imagine: we will be like God Himself (which is what we wanted when we rebelled). Those who reject Him will also receive what they desire, life without Him which, naturally, is suffering. But those who those who choose to become like Him, will no longer suffer. Creation will be perfected, it will be set free from suffering as we have been. In a nutshell (fashioned Drusilla-style) that's the story.

So how can we accept YHWH & not accept the answer we've already been given? We have an enormous amount of power but not so much ability. We are like children who break their toys but don't know how to fix them. Much of our science is dedicated towards trying to fix a broken world. Our social sciences have almost no other purpose. The same is true for much of the work we do these days - most NFPs, NGOs, the United Nations, charities - all mainly exist to fix what is broken but w/o acknowledging that we are the ones who broke it. Too many of us want to accept YHWH (or at least say we do) but don't want to believe that original sin is real. But, if we claim to believe in YHWH then we know we are the ones who broke our world & that we continue to break it. If we claim to believe in YHWH, we must accept the entire story or else we are not believing in God, but rather in some demon or idol. It is not that God is not good, it is that we are not good.

The acquaintance I mentioned earlier once asked me why I follow God. I replied, "Because He is faithful." My acquaintance responded, if a scientist had developed a particularly vicious strain of mice that kept tearing one another apart would I say that scientist was good just because he was faithful? Because of the move & my health, I never had an opportunity to reply. Now I will: if the scientist had given the mice the ability to choose whether or not they would be vicious & even when they chose viciousness he continued to work with them, preparing them for the day when he himself would become a mouse because by doing so & by allowing them to kill Him, he would destroy viciousness & make them able to become scientists like him then, yes, I would say that scientist was good. Having the ability to choose is what makes all the difference. To be able to choose is to have power. God gave us choice. We chose to to rebel against Him, to try to be gods. And we continue to make that same choice. So, in reality, it's not His goodness that is at question but our rebelliousness & our refusal to accept that our actions have consequences - sometimes extremely far reaching consequences. We might ask, why would He give us such power? But once again, we have the answer - choice is the means by which we can become like God: we have to want to become like Him, to choose to become like Him. We might be angry w/ God or think He is loopy for giving us such power but then we must ask ourselves, why do we choose to rebel against the One who is giving us what we want anyway? Why do we rebel against the One who is trying to make us gods?

PS: I undergo my 3rd round of chemo beginning Wednesday. Please pray for me.

Omnipotent, Omniscient, Loving & Good - Pt. 1

2010-09-24T19:28:00.000-04:00

I 've made it to Houston, TX; my move actually occurred on Sunday the 26th of July so I've been here several weeks now. Unpacking has been slow and interspersed with a marathon of medical tests and visits to doctors as I set up a cadre of professionals to replace those I left in NYC. Thus far, I am rather impressed. The doctors here are thorough and work together. Even the hospitals all seem to be together. I've seen branches of certain hospitals in other locations but the main facilities are right next door to each other in a two-three mile strip. My doctors are all super specialists! The fellows, who are MDs but have chosen (and been chosen) to train under my doctors, are at the level of most of the doctors I saw in NYC. The fellows see me first and give me the same answers I received in NYC then the specialists come in and show the fellows how to do their jobs better -- that there are other treatment alternatives, or tests (often simple tests) that might give important information, even that the test results before their eyes are providing information that has been overlooked or underestimated. It's an education and also hard work just being a patient. I realize more and more that my job is to be ill and if I refuse to do it, I won't get better.

What I mean by that is if I don't take this seriously, I won't do what is necessary to get healthier. I won't get the rest I need or the exercise. I won't take my meds on time or eat properly or do the 101 odd things I ought to do; this will only matter to me if I accept the reality of being ill. For example, I've been diagnosed with mild sleep apnea (I stop breathing about seven times each hour) and must use a retainer-like device to keep my airway open while I sleep. It's not as intrusive as the machine many use, it's not surgery, but it is easy to forget to put the device in my mouth - which is a no no - breathing is extremely, fundamentally even, important. So I'll have to work it into my already crowded bedtime prep. But since the alternative is, at least, being sicker and, at worst, death, making certain I insert my breathing retainer is effort well spent.

This morning, I read in Vol. 3 Charity of Luigi Giussani's Is It Possible to Live This Way?:

"If ...the circumstances of life ...make us ...participants in the death of Christ, then sacrifice becomes the keystone of all life -- life's value is in the sacrifice that one lives -- but also the keystone for understanding the history of man. The entire history of man depends on that man dead on the cross, and I can influence the history of man ...if I accept the sacrifice that this moment imposes."

I was originally drawn to Giussani's work because he was the first real intellectual I encountered who got it, who understood that Christ, and Him crucified, must be the foundation of our lives if who we are and what we do is to be reality. This past summer, I became acquainted with a man who asked me for a rational argument for my belief that God is loving and good particularly with all the suffering and pain in the world. After a lengthy correspondence, I told him I was not only ill but in the midst of moving cross country and that I could not continue our conversations until I had settled into my new home. Since arriving in Houston, I've encountered others, some Catholics, who are struggling with God's goodness, who are ratcheting up emphasis on God's love and mercy and downplaying God's power: Omnipotence could not see children suffering and not interfere.

Though I've got some work left to get settled, beginning with this post, I plan to respond to my acquaintance as well as to those others who are struggling with God's loving and good omniscience and omnipotence. It has to begin with reality, like the reality of my illness. This illness is real. That I stop breathing seven times per hour is real. All those I've encountered accept that God is real. They do not accept that God is good. Is that possible? Can God be real and yet not be good? Before my next post (which hopefully will be sooner than the time since my previous one) I'm interested in your responses.

The Reality God Has Given Us

2010-06-18T16:31:00.000-04:00

I'm still around but I've been ill a lot & busy - I really am moving to TX and though I'm doing very little packing, those who are helping need to ask me lots of questions. The nice thing about being ill is that I can usually make the call about whether something goes or stays without worrying about emotional attachments - I'm too tired to be emotional about much.

There are of course many things that take precedence over my health or moving. Some of those things involve our nation. This is one of them and if completed, will affect every user of the internet: conversation about our Catholic faith is just as much a target as the right to exercise freedom of speech on political matters.

We must respond to these continued attacks on our liberties. We must stand up and be counted as citizens of the country where God has placed us. Many might long for another time and place and I so understand that. But we must also accept that God has placed here in this place, at this time. The question then becomes, what are we called to do in the reality God has given us? Each of us must ask and answer that question.

May Day 2010

2010-04-24T14:56:00.000-04:00

[I]f my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. (2 Chronicles: 7:14)

Next Saturday, May 1, 2010, an ecumenical gathering before the Lincoln Memorial will occur. It will be a time of repentance and prayer asking God to forgive us, heal us and help us. I won't be able to make it to DC for this event, but if you can go, please do. Click the button on the right for more information or go here.

Where Did Things Change?

2010-04-17T21:16:00.000-04:00

I've been thinking a lot about where we went wrong. At what point did this country change? You can see it in the difference between the family comedies of the '50s, '60s and early '70s and those of the mid '70s and later. Even within the same program, where once children saying their prayers at bedtime was normal, suddenly it disappeared. In Nanny and the Professor, Phoebe Phigalilly nonchalantly told us her aunt was an evangelist and her work was love. Nanny and the Professor ended in 1972 and with it ended the casual nonchalance of Love as an actual force. We were reminded once again in Highway to Heaven and Touched by an Angel but in those two series, the nonchalance belonged mostly to the angels. I never watched Joan of Arcadia so I can't say anything about how God was presented as an intimate party in her life. I can say the program only lasted for two seasons and God as the unseen player, who creates miracles everyday in each of our lives doesn't make much of an appearance on TV or in our culture any longer.

Michael Moriarity has written an amazing piece, George Orwell's Biblical Prophecy that was published on Andrew Breitbart's, Big Government. He argues that Roe v. Wade was the turning point. Certainly much had occurred before that Supreme Court decision but it just may be that that case, which codified the slaughter of our own children, dealt our souls a mortal blow. We know Who can bring us back to life. The question is, are our hearts too fat, our ears too heavy, our eyes closed; so that we cannot see with our eyes, hear with our ears, and understand with our hearts, and be converted , and be healed? (cf. Isaiah 6:10)

Much Needed Break Day

2010-03-23T22:57:00.001-04:00

Part three of Catholic Witness coming tomorrow or the next day. Today was a dr's appt kind of day. Yesterday afternoon, as I was writing part two, I received a call from the last dr who hadn't sent info to the insurance co. He was faxing my records as we spoke. Please, please pray that this whole waiting to receive insurance payments issue will be finally resolved very soon.

In the meantime, I found this compelling.

"For ourselves, we shall resist [slavery] by speech and vote, and with all the abilities which God has given us. Even if overcome in the impending struggle, we shall not submit. We shall go home to our constituents, erect anew the standard of freedom, and call on the people to come to the rescue of the country from the domination of slavery. We will not despair; for the cause of human freedom is the cause of God.”

Catholic Witness & Those Who Bear The Imprint of Hell

2010-03-22T20:42:00.001-04:00

”…my ~~body~~ flesh is learning Christ's mercy.”

Fallen Sparrow and I often discuss that people don't know how bad it is out there. Most people don't. And with the exception of two with whom I’m particularly close, most of my friends don't know how bad it was for me. If they have read this blog, they know some of it - just as all my readers do. Conversations with me reveal more. But there are things I share with no one. And then a time comes when they must be shared. This is one of those times.

For long, my first memory was of standing with my mouth pressed against a rusty, dusty screen door looking at adults reclining and children playing beside a creek. In the distance there was a thicket of trees. I did not know who the people were. I did not know where I was. I did not even know my name. But I knew I wasn't alone. A Presence was with me, it was almost tangible. A woman shouted at me: "go and finish your nap!" I ran back into a bedroom, climbed into the lower bunk, stared up at the rungs of the bed above and shrugged to the Presence. That Presence has been with me ever since. I came to know Him as my Friend. Through everything else that has ever happened to me, that Presence has been with me. It is important to remember that. It helps.

I've written much about the man who "raised" me and many of the horrible things he did. But there were some horrors that neither he nor his wife directly visited on me. He had children and foster-children. In particular there was his eldest daughter who used her seniority to arrange our lives as if we were in a brothel. She assumed that we all ought to be having sex with at least one of the other children in the house. It did not matter that I was not quite five and had no ability to give any sort of consent. She simply assigned boys to have sex with me and that was that. Except it wasn't. When she wanted satisfaction and none of the boys was available, or later when her boyfriend wasn't available, she used me. Imagine being eight years old and having a sixteen year old thrust her fist into your body? Imagine lying there and waiting for it to be over or hoping it hurt because that's what you deserved? That was my life. Not every day but on many occasions, whenever I was desired.

For me, it all ended one night when I was about thirteen. I had begun to worry about getting pregnant and I just didn't like it: I had a Catechism under my mattress that told me such activities were wrong. I heard sermons in my foster-father’s Church that said the same. I didn't want to be that way and I didn't want it in my life. But I didn't know what to do. When I was desired, I was supposed to remove my clothes and let it happen. But that night my foster-father came home late and the lights were out in my room and when I heard him coming up the stairs I pushed my foster-brother away, put on my nightie and turned on my television. My foster-father pounded on my door and we opened it; by then my foster-brother was dressed. We asked what he wanted, told him we were just watching TV. He gave us an odd look. I bought a lock, put it on my door and when I heard a knock and a voice asking for entry, I said, "No." And when that voice insisted, I said, "No." And I kept saying, "No" until they stopped knocking. And through it all I asked God to please help me to continue saying “No.”

I paid for saying it. They were seriously confused that I would refuse to have sex. I was beaten up, my secrets betrayed, one of my foster-brother's threatened to kill me. Even after I learned my foster-father was dead, I knew I could never return. Though I have often longed for a family and there have been those who suggested I might seek out some of my foster-siblings because they are the closest thing to family I have, I've never returned. There is much I've come to understand about the people who lived in that house and why they behaved as they did and much I will never know this side of heaven. Many children went through that house. As far as I know, they were all sexually abused – if not before then certainly while they lived there. Some introduced new experiences of abuse. One thing I do know, that was not family. That was not even a whacked out, crazy family. When you put it all together, when you realize that the children were as vindictive and destructive as the adults*, when you accept that each person's purpose was to dominate and enslave those below them, then you realize that was an image of hell "and I alone have escaped to tell you"** because of my Friend.

But He didn't exempt me from the horrors of hell. He allowed me to live there for 11 years. And when I tried to leave, tried to enter the foster-care system and get a new set of foster-parents and a new home, I learned that there was even worse out there. My foster-father wasn't poor. Add poverty and you get a whole new level of horror. So back I went to hell. And hell left an imprint in my flesh. From a very young age, I was repeatedly dehumanized. I was at the service of others rage and hatred and sexual desire and just plain boredom. I have spent many years since working to become human. It’s not an easy job. Therapy helped. More knock down, drag out fights with God than I can remember worked wonders. Coming to see that God really loves me and is the Friend who has always been with me made a huge difference. Human friends have helped enormously. And then I returned to the Church and being made human took on a whole new meaning.

I've always been a helpful, outwardly cheerful (inwardly too for a number of years now), caring person and that has helped me make friends. But in returning to the Church I found the kind of friends I never imagined. Not only do they not make it their mission not to hurt me, they make it their mission to love me. There are times when I'm like a burn victim having all the charred flesh scrubbed away, that's just how much they love me. I've awakened in a hospital bed to find a woman I hardly know has come to visit me. I've needed an escort home from the hospital and that same woman has been there - even if given just an hour or two of notice. I've needed help paying my rent these past few months and she helped me. And others have helped me. They've remembered my birthday and bought me toys and fruitcake and listened to me speak and responded as if what I was saying made sense and come to my home to feed me when I'm undergoing chemo and looked sternly at me for doing too much. I even had breakfast prepared for me in my own kitchen by a Jesuit Seminarian in his "SWAT gear" uniform and another friend even brought an upside-down doughnut cake.

Many of my friends will recount what I have done for them but they don't know what they are doing for me: they help me become human! Not fully human but just human. They help me become free to choose for myself so I needn't just remove my clothes and let it happen. This is what Christian witness does for those of us who bear hell’s imprint. It binds us back together. It gives us life. This is why Catholics need to get off their duffs and become active in the public forum because I am not unique. God how I wish I were. I am one of many, many imprinted souls. And I've known that for years. Some of the girls I knew at university, all from homes at least as "privileged" as mine, spoke of "fooling around" with their brothers. Brothers pimp their preteen sisters. Older cousins rape their younger cousins. Mothers and fathers sexually abuse their children. Sex parties are the norm for too many 13 year old kids. And all that sexual abuse, even when it's not considered abuse, does something to a child. It makes them hard. It leaves a deep imprint that poisons the rest of life unless it is healed and only Christ and we Christians letting Him use us in Christian friendship can really do the job.

You don't know how important extending an invitation to brunch is. It doesn't matter if you're shy, it's an easy thing to do. Do it. You don't know how important having a few people over for tea or a movie or a chat is. Do it. So many of us never learned to make a home, never learned to invite people, can't imagine why you'd invite us. Do it. It isn't help from the government we need. It's an invitation to lunch or dinner. Those of us who bear the imprint of hell need the friendship of those who had normal, healthy childhoods. And we need the friendship of those who are having their humanity restored too because we need to know it’s possible. We need to know that Christ comes to save us from the damnation others try to visit upon us. He comes through us. He comes through you.

Our country is in grave peril. We know that. Many traditional Catholics believe impurity is a root cause of that peril and that novenas to Our Blessed Mother are the response. Well perhaps some of those novenas got me to finally write this piece and I hope I’ve opened the can of worms that shows you don’t know what impurity is. Prayers of all sorts are certainly necessary to heal our land but they won’t replace Christian friendship. After the Annunciation, Mary visits Elizabeth. After Mass and holy hours and novenas, we need to visit one another and include those outside our regular group. Ultimately, the imprint of hell is a lie. It burns. It scars. But it needn’t destroy. If we are willing to be friends to others as Christ is to us, our people and our land would flourish.

* My foster-father was investigated for rape. His eldest daughter made the charge. The results were inconclusive.
** Job 1:15

He Always Intended To Vote For The Bill

2010-03-22T12:43:00.000-04:00

I and many others read Bart Stupak's comments from the article in the National Review Online (which was unavailable as I wrote this piece) or in LifeSite News:

"If you pass the Stupak amendment, more children will be born, and therefore it will cost us millions more. That’s one of the arguments I’ve been hearing [from Democrat leaders],” Stupak said in a phone interview published Friday. “Money is their hang-up. Is this how we now value life in America? If money is the issue — come on, we can find room in the budget. This is life we’re talking about.”

But this video from over a year ago tells a radically different story:

We must repeal this bill! And we must get them out of our house! We have no time to waste, no time to lose.

Catholic Witness and the Healthcare Bill

2010-03-21T17:22:00.001-04:00

Fallen Sparrow sent me the link to this First Things article. It is well worth a read as are many of the comments both to enhance our catechesis and to learn the dismal state of many in the Church today. We need to do some work cleaning our own house.

I strongly ecommend Grace McLoughlin's comments at 3.20.2010/12.00 p.m. and Matt Beck's at 3.20.2010/10.19 p.m. My comment, which hadn't appeared as of the time of this post, is below:

Obebedience to the teaching Magisterium is central to what it means to be a faithful Catholic. We may like it or hate it but that's the choice.

In most of the world, people are subject to the state. In the United States, the state is subject to the people. And that puts American Catholics in an odd position. Whereas we are accustomed to being subject to the Church and to the state, here we are subject to the Church and we are each sovereign. We owe obedience to the Church, the government is our servant. We must get that through our head. This is what it means to be an American Catholic.

I am so grateful that Bishop Chaput has made it clear that the nuns who have come out in support of the health care bill are causing confusion amongst the faithful. I am also grateful to God that abortion, conscience protection or any other issues cause the bishops to oppose this bill because whereas abortion is an absolute deal breaker (the blood of 50 million babies is already on our hands) I don't think the bishops have gone far enough.

As Grace commented, subsidiarity is also central to Church teaching. In simple terms, we are to govern our own selves and love our neighbours as locally as possible. We cannot get away with sending a cheque to DC in the form of taxes and have DC love our neighbour for us. We must do it ourselves because the goal of this whole thing is holiness and we only get that by loving one another as Christ loves us.

Charity is a good thing. Church charity, local charity, personal charity are all good things. The Church teaches that health care is a right but how we provide it is left to us. The Church (both Catholics and other Christian denominations) provides an enormous amount of charity health care. We need to support them with our money. We need to provide for our brothers and sisters who are in need, which many do. It's our job. The state can't do it.

Accepting charity is tough. I know this personally. As I write this, I am disabled and in pain (in 15 min I can take my pain meds). I am in one of the many doughnut holes waiting for my disability insurance company to begin making payments to me. Disability has always been part of my salary package and I have paid for it for many years. I never intended to get sick and am hoping to either get better or figure out something I can do to earn a living while being sick. But right now, I'm too sick to work and don't have any savings left and I must wait. But in my wallet are a number of cheques from friends and friends of friends that will pay for meds and utility bills and food. Friends have paid my bills over the past three months. Of course, I can't buy clothes but then I don't need any clothes. I've been fine. I've had what I need. I've had to give up my pride. It hurts. Being homeless and without food and medicine would hurt more. My pride isn't worth keeping. I've been afraid and then I've asked for help and the community in which I live my life has helped me and I am beginning to be less afraid of being in need, in general - my ~~body~~ flesh is learning Christ's mercy.

Charity is a good thing. And it is available to those who want it. It's easier if one is part of a community but it is available to those who want it. We need to do a better job of letting that be known. And we need the Church to stop making negative statements about picking up the pieces of a flawed healthcare system. That is the Church's job and it's a good thing. (It would be even better if we could get rid of the flawed healthcare system but that's another post.)

We have a nation of people who are badly catechised, have poorly formed consciences and are poorly educated as citizens. The Church must do a better job of catechising us. We need the bishops and our parish priests, to remind us regularly of Church teaching on the sanctity of life AND of social teaching including subsidiarity (which many have never heard of before). We need homilies and teaching on pride and all the other deadly sins. We need modern references for humility and love. We need the Church to be more specific and proclaim Church teaching rather than the general homilies about how special we are and how much God loves us.

I pray this bill doesn't pass because I am sick and though I have private health insurance, I will be one of the many who are given pain meds and sent off to die because it is too expensive to pay for my healthcare. I pray it doesn't pass because I know babies will continue to be slaughtered on the altar of convenience. I pray it doesn't pass because the elderly will die of treatable illnesses because some central bureaucracy decides it's too expensive. I pray it doesn't pass because suicide will be recommended. If this bill is passed and actually enacted, death and misery will spread throughout the country but we will have paid our taxes so it won't be our fault.

A Nation of Prayer: Something We Can All Do

2010-03-13T13:35:00.002-05:00

The National Prayer Caucus is a great place to begin. Commit to pray five minutes per week and participate in a 24/7/365 wall of prayer surrounding our nation.

Dems Tell Us What They Think About The Healthcare Bill

2010-03-13T13:11:00.000-05:00

Because the blood of 50 million dead babies cries out to God for justice, because I am one of those who will be given pain meds and allowed to slowly die since my healthcare is too expensive (even though I pay for my own insurance), because I love my country, I say, "Wake up! Get your heads out of the sand! Understand that if we don't get involved, our lives, the lives of our familiy members born and unborn, and, in fact, our very souls are on the line here!"

It's a simple question, will we live the life God has given us in the place He has put us? He has given us neither a king nor a parliment but rather has entrusted each of us with sovreignity. That means each one of us is in charge. We don't have the luxury of saying it's the fault of our elected officials because they're simply our servants whom we hired to do a job. If they're not doing the job, we must replace them with servants who will follow our instructions. We've been given something unique here and the question is, what will we do with it?

He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, `Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not winnow; so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.' But his master answered him, `You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sowed, and gather where I have not winnowed? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him, and give it to him who has the ten talents. For to every one who has will more be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away. And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.' (Matthew 25:24-30)

Time To Take Our Heads Out Of The Sand!

2010-03-13T00:15:00.001-05:00

Are we scared enough yet? Do we understand the evil that we face. It comes down to abortion. It comes down to death. We must fast and pray and sacrifice and suffer and then do it all over again. We must sign petitions and go to our district offices and march on DC and do anything else we can lawfully do to get their attention. And to do that, we must take our heads out of the sand and stop pretending that the party of death is doing anything other than genuinely seeking more and more death. Moral is, we don't get the government to pay for our healthcare unless we allow government to kill our children.

Is that really what we want?

I'd Like To Learn To Follow

2010-03-12T01:02:00.002-05:00

"Let not your hearts be troubled; believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?

I have begun dating again, which doesn't mean I've gone out on any actual dates but only that I have registered on a couple of Catholic dating sites and am talking with one man. Needless to say, I feel better than I did a few weeks ago even though I've now completed chemo infusions and am actually more physically tired than before and am still undergoing the experience of insurance companies and doctors not providing the requested information. But things have calmed down in my home and while registering on a dating site I remembered, I love life. I really, really love life. It's all banquet and I'm happy to be here.

About seven or eight years ago, I made a conscious decision to stop having sex unless I get married. I didn't stop going out with men, but deciding not to sleep with them meant I was going out with them less and less. For many of us here in New York (and I suspect elsewhere too), sex is simply part of dating, occurs on the first, second or third date and continues indeffinitely. Often, men and women will pair off for a few weeks or months but not always. It's not unusual for young New Yorkers to be "dating" several different "partners." It has become almost like shaking hands or kissing a friend on the cheek. Sex is expected, normal, not that big of a deal. And that was always my problem. I've always wanted it to be that big of a deal, always thought it should be one of the biggest deals in my life. Long before I made that conscious decision, I'd already stopped having sex with most of the men I dated.

Getting most (but by no means all) men to stop expecting that I'd sleep with them was easy. Many people know that God and I are "side-by-side," we hang together (in reality, He chooses to hang w/ me but language is so difficult to express these things). I decided to bring God into the conversation and fewer men expected me to be available. And then there was my wounded bird attitude, in which I presented myself as fragile because of being sexually abused as a child, and I really wanted sex but I also wanted a whole lot of other things that would assure me that the man I was with wasn't another abuser. I thought that was the truth - that I just wanted a man to take things slowly and "get to know me." I didn't realize that the truth was that just as I didn't blame God for killing my family or for the abuse I suffered, I didn't see every man as an abuser. I really like men. Enjoy flirting with them and wearing pretty clothes that please them and just being in their company. And I love sex which is why it ought to be a very big deal.

The real truth is that I was living out what I'd been taught: that all men are the enemy just waiting to abuse me, that I am better alone, that sex is for recreation because my body needs to be appeased from time to time. I was taught and kept insisting, I don't need you to take care of me without ever realizing that the corollary is, no one needs me to take care of him.

Illness changes things. When my body no longer does as I command (and for a dancer, that is bigger than big), my ability to control life is gone. Add a bunch of meds that make focus and concentration difficult and one is left with oneself. This past year, lying on my bed, watching old family comedies from the 50s and 60s because TV has become too loud and harsh, I've come to realize that loving and being loved are the best gifts God has given us. All the deep intellectual and spiritual conversations and research and writing and building a career are only so much crap if they take us into separate little worlds where we are walled off from one another. Making a home for a husband who cherishes me and protects me would be worth so much more than anything I've ever done in my life. No one ever taught me that when I was a girl. No one taught me that maybe it's enough to cook a delicious dinner, put on a pretty dress and make my husband happy.

The statistics are not in my favour and there are those who'd diagnose me as profoundly disturbed for venturing out into the fray. I'm not in the 25 - 35 age range that most men on the sites seem to want and without Divine intervention, can't have a child. I'm not a virgin and won't pretend to be. Sex is a big deal to me and I want it to be a big deal to the man I marry. (I think that makes me really scary to a lot of older men who are divorced-and-annulled or widowers or never marrieds.) Plus my health is bad and wind surfing along w/ sports of that sort are certainly not in my near future. It doesn't look good for me in the world of Catholic dating.

But I don't believe in statistics. I believe in God. And I believe that in this banquet, He has created a room for me and for the man who is willing to take the risk and love me exactly as I am, willing to risk that I will love him exactly as he is. I no longer have much else on my list of what he has to be - I'll leave it up to God to surprise me. (It would be lovely if he could teach me to dance the women's part. I was always one of the tallest girls in class and so learned to dance the man's role. I'd like to learn to follow.) And so I re-enter the fray, stroll around at the banquet and trust that God is bringing us both to that room. I've always loved parties and this is one I intend to enjoy to the fullest.

PS - Thank you dear, dear readers for all your prayers.

Great Tidings of Great Joy!

2010-03-04T17:15:00.000-05:00

The Traditional Anglican Church in America has asked to receive entry into the Catholic Church - all 99 parishes!

Isn't God just so, so awesomely amazing?!!!

Stretching My Heels

2010-02-27T09:40:00.000-05:00

For me, giving up would be easy, just taking to my bed and not getting out of it unless absolutely necessary. I'd quickly become weaker and weaker and then I'd never leave my bed. And it would be understandable: I am on so much medication for so many different parts of this illness and now, with this second round of chemo, am so additionally knocked out and in so much more pain, getting out of bed is a chore. My chore.

Entering my bathroom requires a small step up - about two to two and one-half inches, it's an old apartment and the small strip of flooring at the doorway is the original marble so there must have always been a step up. It's the perfect place to stretch my heels.

I stand facing into the bathroom, my toes at the edge of the marble riser, my instep and heels hanging over the hallway flooring and, balancing myself by gently laying my palms on either side of the door frame, I lower my heels until they brush the floor, hold it for eight slow counts and then rise into relevé which I also hold for eight slow counts. Then I repeat the entire sequence another four times, take a break to take my Advair, and do a second set. My first trip to the bathroom becomes an opportunity to keep my heels and calves stretched and my feet strong.

Thus far, it doesn't ease the pain but it prevents the pain tight muscles and tendons would cause. And, it prevents me walking on my toes like a chicken - the chicken walk is most unattractive. It also breaks the pattern of getting out of bed only when absolutely necessary; it even seems to help me make my bed and treat the day as something I must live, in which I act, rather than something I must get through until it's time to take my night meds. It's a little piece of building a new life even when I don't have the strength or energy to think of what that life might be.

Thank God for all that dancing. It's now time for breakfast and I have not only said my prayers (just an Our Father and my usual talking to God but I'll writie about that later), I've stretched my heels and written a post. Not bad for an early morning's work.

Nothing More Than I Can Imagine

2010-02-25T22:04:00.000-05:00

When I was just a bit older than four and one-half my nanny abandoned me. She drove to a garage, took me inside, set me upon an old chair, removed the crucifix I wore around my neck, patted me on the head, told me to be ‘a brave little poppet’ and then left me there. I sat there letting my feet swing, the strong smell of gasoline in the air. Finally a man asked whose child I was. Another man answered that I belonged to the red-haired woman. But the red-haired woman was gone. I sat there letting my feet swing. The men talked. Finally, a man spoke to me, probably asked me something, I don’t know. All I recall are hot, salty tears and begging to go home. The man took me to his home; I lived there for just over eleven years.

Recently, a friend of mine mentioned to me his struggle with wild fantasies, told me that such are often feelings of self-loathing. I responded, “I know” in a non-committal, I hear what you are saying sort of way. I wanted to shout: “I know!” Because I do. Extremely well. I know wild, self-destructive fantasies that ooze self-loathing except in them, I’m perfectly happy to be hurt, to be abused. I even participate in my own abuse until my abuser loves me and abuses me happily ever after. The smell of gasoline haunts me these days.

Right now, I cannot see much of anything except what I can imagine for myself and that is ugly and full of self-loathing. It is a story that might have happened, has parts which came very close to happening, contains elements that actually have happened but is, in total, simply not reality. Regardless of how I have felt about myself, I know God has never abandoned me to the horrors of my imagination. This is a dark time for me. Most of my friends know it is a difficult time but very few understand that I simply want to give up. It isn’t one thing. It’s everything. It’s being ill. It’s chemo. It’s being entangled in the insane bureaucracy of a firm and an insurance company that stand between me and my own money. It’s the excruciating pain of having to ask friends to help. It’s a roommate who became a friend and then revealed herself to be a monster and left me responsible for over $3000 of her unpaid rent. It’s being unable to read for more than a few minutes. It’s being alone so much. It’s also being overwhelmed by the love and care my very dear friends shower upon me. I thought I would be stronger but I’m absolutely exhausted. I simply want to escape. But where would I go? To a place where there are no horrible fantasies? Where the whiff of gasoline doesn’t haunt me?

When I started this piece I thought I’d come to some great conclusion. But I also can’t write for very long these days. And I’ve spent some time scanning through some of my earlier posts on suffering so I know, whatever I feel about it, God has placed me here too weak even to wish I were stronger. I desperately want Him to come and get me. I have no idea what that means. So I’ll just stay here being a not so brave little poppet, just letting my feet swing. He has always come for me in the past. He won’t be stopped by even the most horrible fantasies of my limited imagination.

Basic Education In Freedom

2010-01-17T18:10:00.000-05:00

Judge Andrew Napolitano, faithful Catholic, jurist, Fox News commentator and teacher about the Constitution of the United States offers the basics of freedom in this short video.

For more, see his interview in Reason Magazine. (I've included two appropos excerpts here):

Scholars and lawyers and jurists and people interested in this have always debated what is the source of our rights. There are many, many schools of thought, but they basically fall into two categories. One says that our rights come by virtue of our humanity because we are created in God's image and likeness. Because God is perfectly free, he has instilled in us all the yearnings for freedom that we have: freedom of thought, freedom to develop one's personality, freedom to express oneself, freedom of movement, freedom of religion, freedom of association, etc. That school of thought is known as the natural law. Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the Declaration; James Madison, who wrote the Constitution; and virtually all the Founding Fathers, even though some were deists and some were atheists, they were to a person believers in the natural law.

and

The Catholic Church teaches that every human life is of potentially infinite value, that it can be saved up to the moment of death, and that each soul could present everlasting and eternal glory to God, no matter how evil the person appears. That's about as strong a statement of the primacy of the individual over the state as you could imagine.

Invitation

2010-01-17T15:48:00.001-05:00

Democrats and Republicans tell us what the state of the union is but we live here and work here and worship here. We fight so that our children will be taught the truth and not subjected to various kinds of indoctrination that offends their souls. We fight and pray for the souls of America. The Union of the United States is our home and it's about time we spoke up about the state it is in. On 02.02.2010, we speak. Register now at tvTownhall.

(And check out how your own five minute video could be chosen to be the feature video of the day on tvTownhall.)

Seven Wonders of the World (God is so Good)

2010-01-16T17:37:00.001-05:00

The Seven Wonders of the World ("You Are So Blessed") - Click here for more blooper videos

Dawn Eden Pens a Lovely Piece On Suffering and Joy

2010-01-15T15:49:00.000-05:00

Fulton J. Sheen observed in Calvary and the Mass:
This does not mean our Lord on the Cross did not suffer all He could. It means rather that the physical, historical Christ suffered all He could in His own human nature, but that the Mystical Christ, which is Christ and us, has not suffered to our fullness. All the other good thieves in the history of the world have not yet admitted their wrong and pleaded for remembrances. Our Lord is now in heaven. He therefore can suffer no more in His human nature but He can suffer more in our human natures.

So He reaches out to other human natures, to yours and mine, and asks us to do as the thief did, namely, to incorporate ourselves to Him on the Cross, that sharing in His Crucifixion we might also share in His Resurrection, and that made partakers of His Cross we might also be made partakers of His glory in heaven.

Read the entire piece at Headline Bistro

The Reason Why I've Become Political

2010-01-14T17:23:00.000-05:00

Their ultimate goal is to leave us so discouraged, demoralized, and exhausted that we throw our hands up in defeat. As Barney Frank said, "the middle class will be too distracted to fight."

Read the entire piece.

As Christians, we know that this is despair and that despair is sin. We must not despair.

As I've Said Before, I Like This Woman

2010-01-14T15:10:00.005-05:00

Sarah Palin: my life with a Down's syndrome child
In her memoir, US vice-presidential candidate tells of the problems and the joy of living with her special needs son

Sarah Palin

A couple of years ago I began to notice some peculiar yet familiar physical symptoms, like the smell of cigarettes making me feel more nauseated than usual. For a few weeks, I brushed these aside. Then I began to suspect something.

There was no way I could buy a home pregnancy test in Alaska. I was the state governor. The supermarket cashiers would know, the people in the queue would know, and the next thing I’d see would be a headline. There were still a few things that I thought were not for public consumption, at least not at first.

My chance came when I flew to New Orleans to speak at an oil and gas conference. I asked my security guy to drop me off at a pharmacy. Back at the hotel, before my speech, I followed the instructions on the pregnancy test box. Slowly a pink image materialised on the stick. Holy geez!

Todd and I had always dreamt of a big family, and he, especially, dreamt of having another boy — bookends for his three daughters.

I quickly prayed about this surreal situation. First, that I’d even be able to fathom it. I was happy but I could hear the critics:

“She’ll be distracted from state business.”

“She won’t be physically up to the job.”

“That’s what we get for electing the first woman governor.”

I sighed and stared at the ceiling. These are really less-than-ideal circumstances. And for a split second it hit me: I’m out of town. No one knows I’m pregnant. No one would ever have to know.

It was a fleeting thought, a sudden understanding of why many women feel pressured to make the “problem” go away. Sad, I thought, that our society has elevated things like education and career above the gift of bringing new life into the world. Yes, the timing of this pregnancy wasn’t ideal. But that wasn’t the baby’s fault. I knew, though, what goes through a woman’s mind when she finds herself in a difficult situation. At that moment, I was thankful for right-to-life groups that affirm the value of the child.

I didn’t want to tell Todd on the phone, and when I arrived home after the conference he was away. Between my job and his we kept missing each other, so it was a few weeks before we were in the same room and I told him about the baby. He was ecstatic. For him, it’s always been: the more, the merrier.

We kept our news to ourselves. We had always been private about our pregnancies. Our lives were an open book in virtually every other way, so for us this was just a special, sacred time, the one thing it seemed that just we two could know and enjoy together.

At 12 weeks, I saw my doctor, Cathy Baldwin-Johnson, or CBJ, as we called her. She looked at me kindly.

“Well, you’re 43, so there’s a higher chance of certain abnormalities.”

Then she showed me some statistics, one of which said I had about a one in 80 chance of having a child with Down’s syndrome.

I wasn’t worried. I was healthy as a horse, with four perfectly healthy children. Besides, my sister Heather already had a special-needs son, Karcher, who had autism. He was our family’s angel boy. In our family, we always said God knew what he was doing when he gave Heather the child with special needs. She was the one with the tender spirit who could not only handle but even thrive with a child with “challenges”.

CBJ said she’d like me to have an ultrasound scan, so I walked into the office across the hall. The technician was a sweet, funny older lady who’d been doing the procedure for decades. She prepped me, and we joked about a lot of things while she pressed the wand across my belly.

Then she got a little quieter. Suddenly I flashed back to a grim ultrasound I’d had years before, when a stoic doctor had said: “There’s nothing alive in there” — a miscarriage.

Then the technician smiled. “I see boy parts ... would that be good?”

“Yes, that would be perfect!” God is so good, I thought. He knows what’s best.

She kept passing the transducer across my abdomen, more slowly now. It seemed to be taking a long time. “Oops, sorry. Not sure on the boy parts after all. Your baby might be a girl.”

By then she was taking so long that I didn’t care whether it was a boy or a girl. A healthy fourth daughter would be great. Yep, just fine. Please tell me all is fine.

Then the technician said: “The baby’s neck is a little bit thicker than what we would normally see . . .”

My first thought was, 12 weeks along and you can already measure the baby’s neck? Amazing! Then, a bit more sombrely, I remembered that somewhere along the line I had heard that that was a sign of Down’s syndrome. A whisper of fear tugged at my heart, but I brushed it away with a thought: God would never give me anything I can’t handle. And I don’t think I could handle that.

God knew me: I was busy. Got to go-go-go. I’d always yapped about how lucky I was that my kids were all healthy over-achievers, self-sufficient. Now, I thought, I’ve got a tough job and other kids who need me. I just couldn’t imagine how I could add a baby with special needs and make it all work.

Unless He knows me better than I know myself, I thought a bit dismissively, God won’t give me a special-needs child.

CBJ called the next day. Combined with my age, she said, the ultrasound pictures meant there was now a one in 12 chance the baby had Down’s syndrome. “So?” I thought. That still means about a 90% chance everything’s fine.

“There’s a doctor in Anchorage I want you to go see, a geneticist,” she added. “I’m also offering you an amniocentesis” — the common prenatal test for genetic abnormalities.

I had always flippantly declined the amnios before, thinking they didn’t matter, since I confidently asserted I would never abort anyway. But this time I said yes. This time I wanted information. If there was something wrong, I wanted to be prepared.

Todd was out of town on the day of the appointment, so I visited the geneticist alone — through a back door, under my maiden name. I felt a bit of fear. Three days later, I was in my Anchorage office when CBJ called from her office in Wasilla, my home town. I still remember what time it was: 2:22pm.

“I have the amnio results,” she said. “I think you should come to my office ... Can you come now?”

“No, no, just give me the results over the phone,” I said, indulging in a little denial. If I just steeled myself, I thought on some wishful level, if I just took the medicine straight, maybe God would reward my guts with good news.

CBJ hesitated, then said, “No ... I really think you need to come out here.”

“Cathy, I’ve got so much to do here today. It’s okay ... whatever it is, it’s fine, just go ahead and tell me now.”

“Okay,” she said softly. “This child will be born with Down’s syndrome — ” “I’m coming to Wasilla,” I interrupted and hung up the phone.

I was shocked beyond words. Shocked that this was happening. How could God have done this? Obviously He knew Heather had a special-needs child. Didn’t He think that was enough challenge for one family? I drove the 45 minutes to Wasilla gritting my teeth. I’m not going to cry. I’m not going to cry.

My stoicism in difficult times had always bugged and puzzled my friends and family. Bristol, my eldest daughter, once asked: “Mom, why don’t you ever cry? The rest of us are watching some movie, crying our eyes out, and you’re just sitting there.”

Though I didn’t tell Bristol this, I choke up all the time — at The Star-Spangled Banner, at any military event, seeing newborn babies — but secretly, where no one can see. Maybe it was because I’d grown up hunting and fishing with the guys, throwing elbows on the basketball court. Even when my heart was breaking on the inside, I just never wanted to seem weak. Now, as I pressed the accelerator past the speed limit towards Wasilla, my eyes stayed dry and my mind raced.

Maybe the test is wrong. Maybe my results are switched with somebody else. Maybe it’s a mistake. God ... are you listening?

But when I got to CBJ’s office, she showed me the pictures. There was an extra copy of chromosome 21.

“It’s a boy,” she said.

“A boy? You’re sure? Thank you, God.” For me, that was a glimmer of light, and I let it warm me as CBJ walked out of her office and returned with a book for expecting parents of babies with Down’s syndrome. I thanked her and laid it in my lap, unopened.

I just wasn’t ready; my sisters were the ones who could handle this, not me. Did I have enough love and compassion in me to do this? Don’t you have to be wired a little differently to be gifted with the ability to raise a special-needs child, a child who isn’t “perfect” in the eyes of society? I didn’t know if I should be ashamed of myself for even thinking these things.

I read that almost 90% of Down’s syndrome babies are aborted — so wasn’t that a message that this is not only a less-than-ideal circumstance but also one that it is virtually impossible to deal with? Now, just a couple of hours into this new world, I could not get my arms or heart around it. That fleeting thought descended on me again, not a consideration so much as a sudden understanding of why people would grasp at a quick “solution”, a way to make the “problem” just go away. But again, I had to hold on to that seed of faith.

Todd finally returned a few days later. He plopped down on the bed, still in his winter coat. I handed him the ultrasound pictures, and that’s when the dam broke. I could let my guard down.

“It’s a boy,” I said between the tears. “It’s definitely a boy.”

He looked up at me, and his eyes filled with tears. “See, Sarah? God knows what He’s doing! This is great.”

I stood beside the bed. I didn’t know how to say it any other way but straight. “The baby has Down’s syndrome.”

Todd didn’t speak. I remember him lying back on the bed, holding the ultrasound pictures and flipping through them. He’d look at one, put it in the back of the stack, look at the next. Over and over, silently, as though looking for answers.

Finally I sat down next to him. In his subdued way, he did not offer a reaction. So I had to ask. “Well ... what do you think?”

“How can they tell?” he asked quietly. “Are they sure?”

“Yes. There’s an extra chromosome.”

He set the pictures aside and turned his face towards mine. “I’m happy, and I’m sad,” he said.

I thought it was pretty perfect the way he said that, because that’s the way it was. That’s the way I felt, too.

Todd said, “It’s going to be okay.”

I asked if he had the same question I had: “Why us?”

He looked genuinely surprised by my question and responded calmly: “Why not us?”

From that moment, Todd never seemed to worry about it. Instead, he’d think out loud, wondering what the baby’s gifts would be. “What will he want to do?” he wondered. “Will he want to tinker with me in the garage? Will he want to ride on the four-wheeler and drive the skiff? I bet he’ll love to fly with me.”

He started asking other people with special-needs children a lot of questions: what does your kid do? Does he play any sports? From the start, my husband was much more accepting and optimistic than I was. His attitude was kind of like, “Well, okay ... here we go!” But I was still having a hard time wrapping my head and heart around it. So we didn’t share the pregnancy with anyone else, even our children, Track, Bristol, Willow and Piper.

It was such a tough thing to explain, and I just wasn’t ready to grapple with it yet or answer any questions. I had always faced life head-on, but here was something that had humbled me into silence.

I began writing a letter about the baby to our family and closest friends. In my research on Down’s syndrome, I learnt that these special kids most often bring joy into their family’s lives. While they had developmental challenges, they were also affectionate, generous and cheerful. Rather than focus on what could be perceived as negative, I wanted our loved ones to focus on the fact that this baby, every baby, has purpose, and that not only would he learn from us, but we would learn from him.

I decided to write the letter as though it were from his Creator, the same Creator in whom I had put my trust more than 30 years before. I hoped that even though this new baby would present challenges, we’d trust that God knew best.

Among other things, I wrote that “every child is created special, with awesome purpose and amazing potential. Children are the most precious and promising ingredient in this mixed-up world you live in down there on earth. Trig is no different, except he has one extra chromosome. Doctors call it Down’s syndrome, and Down’s kids have challenges but can bring you much delight and more love than you can ever imagine . . .”

Writing that letter was the best and most loving way I could find to share our news with the people we loved. I had no idea that a year later during the vicepresidential campaign a hostile journalist would use it to mock my family and the Christian faith, saying I was so selfabsorbed that I even wrote a letter “in the voice of God”.

Before we knew it, I was seven months along. I hadn’t put on a lot of weight and with winter clothes and a few cleverly draped scarves, no one saw my girth or suspected I was pregnant. But a blazer was getting tight enough that Willow looked at me one day and said, tactfully: “Geez, Mom, you’re porking up!”

“Oh, hush,” I said. “Now pass me the Häagen-Dazs. Chocolate, with peanut butter.”

I hadn’t quite finished writing my letter about Trig. But we shared the news with family and a few close friends that I was pregnant. The kids, of course, were overjoyed.

Shortly after that, we decided to go public, so I invited over three reporters, whom I knew well. I knew I could have just spoken candidly and said, “Hey, I’m going to have a baby . . .” Instead, I decided to have a little fun.

“Hey, guys,” I said with a grin, “I wanted to let you know that the first family is expanding.”

They all just looked at me. Dead silence.

Okay . . . let me try something else.

“Remember when I promised to ‘deliver’ for Alaska?”

Nothing. But now they took out their notepads and pens. Big scoop coming, they could feel it.

Finally, I gave up on the jokes and went direct: “Guys, I’m pregnant. I’m having a baby in two months!”

Three mouths fell open, and three pairs of eyes dropped straight to my stomach. I laughed out loud. The guys whipped out their phones as I waved goodbye. Within 10 minutes, the news was all over.

The next month, Todd and I checked into a hotel in Dallas. The following day I was scheduled to address another oil and gas conference. My pregnancy was going fine, and with five weeks to go, I felt great. But at 4am a strange sensation low in my belly woke me and I sat up straight in bed.

It can’t be, I thought. It’s way too early. Moments later, I shook Todd awake. “Something’s going on.”

He sat up in bed, instantly alert. “I’m calling CBJ.”

“No, don’t do that. It’s 1am in Alaska.”

I didn’t want to call anyone yet. I just wanted to take stock and see whether this baby was really coming. I also wanted time to pray and asked God silently but fervently to let everything be okay. Desperation for this baby overwhelmed me. Please don’t let anything happen to this baby. It occurred to me, once and for all: I’m so in love with this child, please, God, protect him! After all my doubts and fears, I had fallen in love with this precious child. The worst thing in the world would be that I would lose him. God knew what He was doing.

Over my protests, Todd called CBJ. I told her that I felt fine and absolutely did not want to cancel my speech and disappoint the folks at the conference. We agreed that I would take it easy, give my speech, then catch an earlier flight back to Alaska. I still had plenty of time.

Later that afternoon I spoke on the urgent need to tap conventional supplies and innovate on stabilising renewable sources. The audience graciously gave me a standing ovation. Then I handed the mic back to Governor Rick Perry of Texas, my co-host, and walked off the stage.

“Hey,” Rick drawled over the sound system with a chuckle, “we’re not finished with the programme!”

I turned around, smiled, waved and kept moving.

“I know you’re pregnant,” Rick said, joking into the mic. “But don’t tell me you’re going off to have the baby right now!”

The audience laughed. I smiled and waved goodbye. I thought, if you only knew!

I reached Todd at the exit, and he eyed me with a grin. “Love this state, but we can’t have a fish picker born in Texas.” It was a calm, relatively restful flight home.

Many hours and two flights later, with Todd and our daughters nearby, I delivered Trig Paxson Van Palin into the world at Mat-Su regional medical centre. When the nurse placed him in my arms, I was overwhelmed with love and with wonder. I knew God had answered my prayer so completely. He just nestled softly into me as if to say, “Aaaah ... I’m here, Mom.”

I was glad God brought him to us early. We were so anxious to meet him. I hadn’t known what to expect. I didn’t know what he would look like or how I would feel. But when I saw him, my heart was flooded with unspeakable joy. I knew that not only had God made Trig different but He had made him perfect.

The girls gently cooed and cuddled and quietly helped swaddle their new baby brother. Todd beamed. I heard him whisper to CBJ: “Hmmm, he doesn’t look Down’s.” CBJ looked up at Todd and gave him a kind, knowing smile.

When I look at my beautiful son today, I know what her smile meant. She sees it in the eyes of other parents who have a child that perhaps our world doesn’t consider precious or prized. I see photos of Trig and can recognise the physical traits that let all Down’s children look like brothers and sisters, the characteristics that may puzzle some who, just like me a few months prior, don’t yet understand. But looking at these children in real life, we see only perfection.

During the presidential election campaign in 2008 I visited Cedar Rapids, Iowa, a slice of Americana, with its quaint town square with mom-and-pop stores; red, white and blue bunting; moms and dads; kids in strollers; seniors; and people of every colour.

I was moving through the crowd, shaking hands and signing posters and hats and shirts, when I suddenly came to a stop. Standing on the other side of the rope were a woman and two teenagers whom I could not miss. The kids had Down’s syndrome. A boy and a girl.

“Hi, what’s your name?” I said to the girl, smiling.

The girl stammered for a minute and finally managed to say, “Sarah.”

“Sarah!” I said. “That’s my name, too! It’s so great to meet you, and we have the same name. Isn’t that amazing?”

Then I turned to the boy, and my heart just melted. Trig’s face flashed into my mind, and I thought: this could be my son 15 years from now.

By then, Trig was going on five months old and we were still learning the ropes of having a child with Down’s syndrome. We were so enjoying this little guy with his just-happy-to-be-here demeanour and his silly smiles, and watching him get stronger, chubbier and more fun every day, just like any other baby. Still, we were curious about what was ahead. We were managing well with him as a baby, but what about a toddler? As a teenager?

I reached over the rope and laid my hand against the boy’s face. “Let me look at you,” I said. “I want to get a good look at how beautiful my Trig is going to grow up to be.”

That was a turning point for me. At that moment, I realised in awe that these precious ones are all brothers and sisters. Before Trig was born, I didn’t know what to expect and we had a natural uncertainty about perceived “imperfection”. There, on the rope line in Cedar Rapids, I realised that my Trig is part of a large and very special community.

Look how their mother was making it work with these two precious teenagers. She cared so much to bring them out to a crowded, hectic but fun rally and give them what might be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, a presidential campaign event in their own hometown. I just knew there was no need to fear any more. At this rowdy rally in Iowa my world became a more peaceful place. Todd was right: everything was going to be all right.

As it turned out, the number of special-needs kids and adults who began showing up at events along the trail was spectacular. It was one of the absolute best parts of the campaign. I heard from experienced staffers that organisers would typically need maybe a sign-language interpreter and a handicapped area large enough to accommodate a few dozen wheelchairs. But it seemed that at all our stops, the number of wheelchairs multiplied, as did the number of kids and adults with various challenges.

On rope lines across the country, I remember making eye contact with special-needs families and carers. This connection was a kind of mutual acknowledgment that said, yes, their lives are precious. They’re worthy. And now we’re going to let America know that there’s no need to be afraid or hesitant. Instead, let’s work together to make this world a more welcoming place for everyone with special needs.

I remember another rally down in Pensacola, Florida. Up in the stands, I spotted a group of 15 kids with Down’s syndrome wearing shirts that said, “We love Trig!” and, “Trig in the White House!”

It was after meeting all these amazing people that Todd and I proudly displayed the bumper sticker a very cool group from Arizona sent us. It read, “My kid has more chromosomes than your kid!”

© Sarah Palin 2009 Extracted from Going Rogue: An American Life, by Sarah Palin, HarperCollins; 1st edition (November 17, 2009). Extract taken from The Sunday Times of London BooksFirst on 0845 271 2135

Via Texas for Sarah Palin - The Greater Reality

2010-01-14T11:04:00.001-05:00

Ben Shapiro - God to Palin: 'You Go, Girl'

Here are some choice morsels from Ben Shapiro's Wednesday Townhall.com column:

Over the weekend, former John McCain campaign strategist Steve Schmidt told "60 Minutes" something shocking about McCain's former running mate, Sarah Palin. It seems that when Schmidt met Palin after McCain selected her, he was surprised that she was so calm. Schmidt apparently asked her how she could remain so tranquil in the face of such a monumental life change. She responded, "It's God's plan." read more

My Friend Randy Beeler On The "Real" Church

2010-01-13T22:39:00.000-05:00

I am striving for sanctity, because in this way I shall be useful to the Church. I make constant efforts in practicing virtue. I try faithfully to follow Jesus. And I deposit this whole series of daily virtues—silent, hidden, almost imperceptible, but made with great love—in the treasury of God's Church for the common benefit of souls. I feel interiorly as if I were responsible for all souls. I know very well that I do not live for myself alone, but for the entire Church … (from the Diary of Saint Faustina Kowalska, ¶1505)read more

"I Don't Want Friends"

2010-01-11T19:40:00.001-05:00

I have just been through one of the most difficult times of my life. That’s not really true – there were no guns involved and no one died and I was not left hungry and alone. So perhaps it wasn’t one of the most difficult times but it was a very, very hard time. A time of facing fear. A time when I found myself in a place I had been before and wanted to run except my running days are in the past, and perhaps in the future (certainly, I shall run and dance in heaven – but for now, I’m only talking about earth) – running in the present isn’t an option. I can’t breathe well enough and haven’t the energy – and it would hurt, a lot. So instead of running, I remained still and did what I knew I must do, I asked for help. And my friends came. And they helped. They lifted me up and carried me to a place where I could rest my head (and that’s very important because I am recovering from a nasty bout of the flu).

Help came from friends I’ve known for years and from those I’ve only known through the internet but have not yet met face to face. People came to my home and refused to let me work, made me sit in my comfy leather chair and rest while they danced about me and made my annual Epiphany party a joy, an occasion of laughter and fun. And when I was too tired to sit up any longer, they sent me to bed and cleaned and left a huge amount of cake in my refrigerator and even took out the garbage. Friends ensured that I would be able to pay my rent and utility bills and buy medicine and eat and have a cushion while I wait for my long term disability cheques to begin. Friends did not leave me alone but came to be with me and my suffering wasn’t worth a moment’s attention because I was too busy being grateful and delighted and having my stony heart broken into a million glittering pieces; I think they made it a more the kind of heart that pumps love into the Body of Christ because friends have been pumping so much love into me. I have no family but I am very, very fortunate because I have such dear, dear friends.

My roommate is moving out at the end of this month. I’ve only known her since November but in that time she too has become very, very dear to me. She has been my friend, become part of the dance that has woven it’s way around and through my life and cared for me when I was unable to care for myself. She has laughed at me and my love of butter, laughed when I knew she was giving me a mushroom sautéed in margarine, laughed at the funny expressions on my face and the childish delight I have been unable to hide. We’ve shared secrets and discoveries and she bakes a mean apple pie. Already I miss her and I will miss her more than any other roommate I’ve ever had. She is a younger sister I never knew I needed or wanted. She is like my friends’ two month old baby son, they can’t imagine life without him. She has come into my life and my home, into the lives of my friends, and I and they are richer because of her. We all desire to welcome her into our lives, to create space for her and her friends, to throw our arms around her and love her.

But she does not want friends. She has actually told me that. She is very young and her youth is evidenced by that one fact: she does not want friends. She tells me I have wonderful friends, amazing friends, she has befriended me herself, but she does not want friends. She desires to make a separate place for herself where she will be alone with the painful secrets of her life and no one will know her. So while telling herself that we will still be friends, she engages in a headlong rush to double her rent and deprive herself of friendship at a time when she cannot afford to spend so much money, to lose any love.

And all I can do is weep for her, let my heart ache because friendship is more valuable than she knows and I haven’t the words to convince her of that. My loss is immense, made larger by knowing how huge a loss she is imposing upon herself. I have not always valued friendship as I should, though I have been granted the grace, thus far, of not walking away from what I knew at the time to be the gift of friendship. I want more for her. My friends want more for her. We know she was made for more. She wants less. Please keep her in your prayers. Lord, please heal her.

* Please keep me in your prayers too. I will be undergoing another round of chemo once I recover from the flu. And though I had planned to move to TX at the end of February, I will have to delay the move until this summer. Oh, and of course I’m searching for a new roommate. But it's still a glorious time and God is so good.

Please Keep CA & Prop 8 In Your Intentions

2010-01-09T14:05:00.000-05:00

And please consider fasting: "Who knows, God may yet repent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we perish not?" (Jonah 3:9)

I've Removed The Ads

2010-01-07T12:17:00.000-05:00

I'm at home in bed a lot, worrying about money too much, trying to do everything I've been given to do to care for myself and it's just not enough. Two people have helped me: one gift through this site and a loan from a friend and I am very grateful. But there's a big difference between a reguar paycheck and waiting for disability payments to begin or to be given permission to use money that belongs to you but isn't yet available due to some technical rules that make absolutely no sense and boil down to, we must be certain to cover our derrieres. It's rather maddening particularly when one is sick. But advertisements aren't the way to go.

I do ask your prayers, particularly for my financial situation. And I wish all the silly people making rules and more rules and more rules would just sit down and talk to people like me so that they'd know, what we need and how horrid it is to make things so much more difficult for people already facing so much.

If you have any say in the matter, don't get sick. Of course if that's what God brings, then I pray for the love and care, including practical care, you need to make it through. Sometimes I wish I was a sister or a nun in an infimary - it would be good to rest.

A Particular Gift We Americans Have Been Given

2009-12-24T12:02:00.000-05:00

Will we treat it like used Christmas wrapping or cherish it as the precious and undeserved gift it is?

Healthcare "Reform" Is A Very Catholic Issue

2009-12-24T02:45:00.001-05:00

Funding abortions is only one pro-death provision that is included in the bill. Please just listen and become aware:

God bless and have a blessed Christmas!

It's Time for Sanity

2009-12-19T01:06:00.000-05:00

I haven't time to wrte my Green post at the moment (I've been sick quite a lot and otherwise occupied these past two weeks). One or two things must be said though.

First, there are poor, developing nations that have neither the funds nor the infrastructure to care for their citizens. I would love to research nations one-by-one and write about those that are developing and those that are like Brazil:

"Speaking as the voice of the developing world," Brazilian President Lula da Silva gave a passionate speech where he scolded the developed world for not negotiating on climate change in good faith with poorer nations. He also said this conference is not about climate change, but about economic opportunities for the developing world."

Brazil is not a developing nation. It is, and for long has been, a corrupt nation. A nation that denies 98% of it's citizens the opportunity to rise above a level of poverty that no one in this country can imagine, even those who live in the Appalachians. In this country, we can choose to change our lives. Hard work, patience, creativity, faith, hope and often a hand up are all necessary. But in the United States of America, we can create lives for ourselves and our families.

In Brazil, particularly in the cities, many, many children live on trash heaps. Those who have families are fortunate as are those who live in favellas. Many children are left on their own, sometimes while they are just toddlers. They band together and survive but without the socializing influence of family and community, they become feral and very, very dangerous. There is a small middle class that is happy not to live as the poor do; mostly they are silent; the favellas are given a nice bright coat of paint just in time for Carnivale. And then there are the fabulously wealthy who have been known to hire death squads to kill homeless children as they sleep in shop doorways; one doesn't want to frighten the tourists away. Without the Church* and other charitable organizations, many, many Brazilians would be consigned to utter hopelessness.

Brazil is a beautiful country with abundant resources. But those who govern Brazil desire only their own wealth, their own comfort. Brazil and Mexico and Argentina and so many other developing nations need to look to their own misdeeds, to their own failure to acknowledge the dignity of the human beings who also just happen to be the citizens of their countries. Instead, Brazil is demanding handouts. And Europe and North America are planning to donate $100 billion to line the pockets of corrupt officials who go by many names but never provide a framework which will foster "domestic tranquillity and the common good"?! It's indecent! It's evil.

In the last paragraph of the article UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown sums it up beautifully:

"Without common action," extreme temperatures will create a new generation of poor with climate change refugees driven from their homes by drought, climate change evacuees fleeing the threat of drowning, the climate change hungry desperate for lack of food," Brown said. "Hurricanes, floods, typhoons and droughts that were once all regarded as the acts of an invisible god are now revealed to be also the visible acts of man.

That's their story and they're sticking to it. So nations have no responsibility for themselves. Instead, breathing causes all the problems that exist from warts to typhoons. CO2 makes up 4% of what we exhale with each breath. It's not a poison nor is it a pollutant. It's what causes plants to grow and actually helps filter harmful radiation. The world's climate changes because God created it to change: this is part of "the whole creation ...groaning in travail together." (Romans 8:22)

Evil men are perpetrating monstrous evil on the world. The truth is being revealed but most people I encounter are so steeped in the belief that simply living in a prosperous country is destroying the earth and that an apocalypse is just around the corner. God is no longer in charge. We are alone. Redemption is a lie. There are even those who trumpet: "It's too late to change! We're all doomed."

Yesterday I finally finished reading Sarah Palin's autobiography, Going Rogue: An American Life. I may have mentioned before that I like this woman. I will admit that I tend to like anyone who believes in baking cakes - cake may be my second favourite food, after butter. But when I learned her favourite verse of Scripture, I saw more clearly why I like her so much. Fallen Sparrow's often reminds me of this:

...God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.** (2 Timothy 1:7)

Our job is to be witnesses to the truth. God is in charge. We are not. It's as simple as that. We can wreck havoc with bombs but not with breathing. We must be good stewards of our world, we must not foul it with garbage and real poisons and pollutants (like hormones from birth control pills which actually harm fish), but we can exhale, without fear. Anything else is monstrous madness and we have been given the soundness of mind to know it. God has not created a zero sum game wherein my good prevents yours. Instead, he has given us a world full of abundance, of minds with the ability to care for the gift of this world and provide for our needs - both, at the same time. We must rouse ourselves and each from this silly dream and do our jobs as witnesses to the Truth.

* As in much of Latin America and most poor countries, many different Christian denominations minister to the needs of the poor. The Catholic Church is in the forefront (and everywhere else too) but my use of the term "Church" here includes all denominations.

** [for Nerds only] Translation from the King James Version. The RSV has "self-control" rather than "of a sound mind." Other translations use self-discipline, good judgement, sobriety, etc. Had I more time I'd conduct further research but for now, I'll depend on Liddell and Scott which includes them all but offers "soundness of mind" first. That translation is appropriate to this particular piece.

*** I can documentat the statements I've made in this post.

2009-12-18T15:51:00.001-05:00

I've added advertisements after my posts. My big fear is that some thing I find utterly abhorent, like "Green" garbage or birth control will be advertised. Supposedly I can filter some of that out so we'll just give this a try. I may see if I can find more precise ads to replace these (like I saw an Ad for eCards from a community of the Poor Clares) and if any of you know of sources, please comment. This isn't to make money - at least not necessarily. Rather, it's to broaden things a bit.)

(NB: I don't know what happened there but this is the way it should have been.)

We're Not the First!

2009-12-09T22:58:00.000-05:00

"They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger?
Will it be the next week, or the next year?
Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house?
Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction?
Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?

Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power.
Three millions of people, armed in the holy cause of Liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us.
Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us.

The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave."

---- Patrick Henry, given at the Second Virginia Conference, Richmond, Virginia on March 23, 1775 (the "Grant Me Liberty or Grant Me Death" speech)

Rattling the Tin Cup

2009-12-09T20:13:00.000-05:00

You may have noticed the "Donations Now Accepted" button I placed in the right section not long ago. It was rather a scary thing to do even though I know other bloggers "rattle the tin cup" from time to time. Blogging is a gift and one doesn't charge for a gift. It makes no sense to me that I should charge anyone who wants to read my writing - at least not in this forum. But, times have changed and my tentative request for donations is now a genuine appeal.

I've been out on disability since July which has been fine because I've had some level of salary continuation and have been able to cover my bills. Now that is over and I've been trying to get straight answers from my firm re my relationship with them. If I am no longer an employee, I have access to the money I need to pay my December and January bills while I wait for my long term disability policy to begin (that begins as of 1/5/10 but won't be paid out until later in the month because firms and organizations don't do their jobs in a timely fashion). Those funds will also cover my move to Texas where the weather is warmer and easier on my joints, and the doctors I've encountered are focused on helping me get well rather than on just medicating me into a zombie.

If I am an employee of the firm, I must wait until they decide to release me and can't use the funds in my profit sharing account and those are the only savings I have left. After being out sick last year and paying the expenses so that I could make it through work this year (including $200+/week for taxis so I could get a little more rest on the way to and because I was so exhausted and in pain returning from work), I have no other savings left. I've been going back and forth for a while with my firm and may well need to have an attorney write them and get a straight answer. Fortunately, I have a friend who has been volunteered to help me.

Not too many years ago, I could just wait it out but I can't now. I'm already beginning to delay refills on certain prescriptions and visits to certain doctors - $10, $15 and $25 copays add up very quickly; I'm trying to avoid spending as much as possible. This will all be resolved: because I have a policy and needn't wait for SSI; I'm certainly in a more fortunate place than many I know. Right now though, I could use financial help.

So if my writing gives you anything good and you can afford it, I'd appreciate any donation you care to make. And if you do decide to donate, please know that I am very grateful. Of course if you don't decide to donate, you're still welcome. Please also keep me in your prayers, especially pray that I will have the courage to do the task that is before me this minute and not worry about anything else. I'll keep you updated and in my prayers.

Thanks so much.

Drusilla

On The 40th Day Evil Reveals Itself

2009-12-08T15:26:00.000-05:00

This article is important because it shows the attitude of those at the Copenhagen conference. I don't think most of them realize the evil they are representing, the evil they are playing with as children play with toys. The desire to control, to destroy millions of human beings, to prevent the birth of millions more, to make a world without people is madness and, at the same time, evil.

This is the revelation of what we have been asking God to heal in our world. Somehow being people who worship God, who thank God, who value God's gift of a land where God may be worshipped in peace is fighting this madness. The 40 days may be ending today but the job is only beginning; today, we have been shown the enemy and are asked if we will continue to fight.

An Important Article

2009-12-04T01:38:00.003-05:00

It has been a bad day and I should be asleep but I did one last email check, found this article and realized I must post it. It's a response to why there are those who actually hate Sarah Palin.

I'm slowly making my way through her autobiography and I must say, I really like this woman. She asked God to make certain that she is always conected to Him, even if by just a string; that she would be a kite under His control. (I'll provide the exact quote when I have a chance.) How could I not like someone who has such an intimate relationship with God? And who's a mother and, often, has amazing style?

Anyway, before I begin rambling, read the piece and let me know what you think.

Abby Johnson's Story - Part II

2009-12-03T01:18:00.001-05:00

Every one deceives his neighbor,
and no one speaks the truth;
they have taught their tongue to speak lies;
they commit iniquity and are too weary to repent.
Heaping oppression upon oppression, and deceit upon deceit,
they refuse to know me, says the LORD. (Jeremiah 9:5-6)

We do it so early:

"Mom! May I have a cookie?"
"No, it's too close to dinner."
"Dad! May I pleeeez have a cookie? I’m so hungry!"
"Okay, but just this one time. And don't tell your Mother! She'd say it's too close to dinner."

Result: A cookie.

Learned: If one authority says No, another will say Yes! Keep going to authorities until the right one agrees.

Skill: Lie to yourself about the existence of authority so as to protect the secret that you are your own ultimate authority; you decide for yourself what is right and what is wrong.

Abby Johnson volunteered to escort women into the facilities in Bryan, TX, she interned with the group and, after college, began working for Planned Parenthood (PP) – an organization that she felt helped women and gave them alternatives, provided them with gynecological care and reproductive services such as birth control and, when absolutely necessary, abortion. But Abby believed that women should have choices so when her Southern Baptist church “felt there was a spiritual conflict in what [she] was doing” and when it and a nondenominational one told her she could not join, Abby and her husband made the sort of choice many, many self-respecting people make today, they began worshipping at an Episcopal church that welcomed them. “Though she was raised Southern Baptist… [she] just [began] to rationalize it. [She] didn’t want to leave these women without options, so [she began] to think [she was] doing the right thing, although it [didn’t] feel right.”*

Abby worked her way up to director of PP in Bryan, TX and found herself responsible for twelve service areas including contraceptives and abortions. At PP, Abby learned many things. She learned that non-sonogram guided, surgical abortions cost about $475, that the doctors who performed them were paid about $75, that other costs were minimal and so PP earned nearly $400 each for these types of abortions; medical (RU486) and surgical abortions brought in more money than contraceptive and healthcare services. Abby learned to reconstruct the pieces of dismembered babies on a tray to ensure there were no parts of the body left in a woman’s womb; it was dead tissue. When the economic climate changed she learned that there was no need to be concerned because abortions offset losses from contraceptive and healthcare services which were being used less frequently.

Eventually, Abby was told to increase the number of abortions because PP was unhappy with it’s balance sheet. When she mentioned that reproductive and women’s healthcare services were PP’s mission, she was told to focus on getting in as many abortions as possible. Doing so was simple. PP, which had previously provided abortions only on alternate Saturdays, began to provide medical abortions every day while it continued to provide surgical abortions only on alternate Saturdays. The more abortion was available, the more women came to have them. One day, a married couple came in planning to have an abortion because they said they could not afford to have more children. They wanted to know if the mother was pregnant with twins and when a sonogram revealed that in fact the mother was carrying two babies, they were elated and realized they couldn’t abort. Abby counseled them to trust that decision. After the couple left, she was asked if she had at least collected the fee for the sonogram – she had forgotten. Abby began to realize there was a problem with PP and she was right in the midst of it.

Then came the Saturday that Abby was asked to assist with a sonogram guided abortion. Those cost more and were more rarely performed. The mother was sedated and unaware of the drama playing out around her and her child. Abby’s job was to move the probe on the mother’s abdomen to locate the child in his mother’s womb. What she saw on the screen was astounding. Abby, the mother of a three year old child, saw a perfectly formed thirteen week-old baby; she had seen the same image while having a sonogram when she was twelve weeks pregnant with her own daughter. “What am I doing here!” she asked herself as the doctor inserted the instrument. As soon as it touched the placenta, the baby jerked, Abby jerked. Then she watched in horror as the tiny infant frantically paddled his feet trying to escape. Abby realized the baby was alive and desperately fighting for his life. The doctor brought the instrument up against the baby’s perfectly and delicately formed spine and turned on the suction. Abby watched the tiny spine crumple and then whoosh! The baby was gone. She dropped the probe.

Abby’s hand was resting on the mother’s abdomen and she realized, there was a life here and now he is gone. The doctor looked at her in anger because she had dropped the probe. Abby picked it up and told herself, “I will never do this again.”

* I felt it important to change Abby's quotes from second person to third person so that her words would be directly describing her own personal experience.

** Part III coming soon.

He's Coming!

2009-12-01T01:12:00.000-05:00

I tend to forget that I can only do one thing each day. Then laundry day comes around and with it I inhale many puffs of various breathing meds & am ustterly wiped out by a task that I once did in an hour and a half, early in the a.m. before running off to do so much more. Today was laundry day (6 - 7 weeks since the last one) and I am exhausted. But then I read the Sisters of Life Advent meditation & realized I could share it without demanding too much more of myself. Here it is; may God bless every one of us:

Dear Coworkers of Life,

During Advent, in contemplation of Christ’s entrance into the world, one finds light in many unexpected and hidden places. The extraordinary is clothed with the ordinary, full of the mystery of the light that is Christ. We begin with the Holy Spirit, who will always point the way to Christ. We begin with a quote from Cardinal O’Connor, who spoke so beautifully of The Holy Spirit, Our Lady and the mystery of the Incarnation.

“The first Pentecost took place within Mary and the result of the first Pentecost was the conception of Christ in the womb.”

“The Holy Spirit will come upon you. The child to be born will be called the Son of God.” When Mary accepted Gabriel’s message with her “yes”, she received the Holy Spirit, and this moment, the first Pentecost, was the moment of the Incarnation. From that moment, when she received the Holy Spirit and Jesus Incarnate, she would see everything in light of Christ. Cardinal O’Connor continues, moving from Pentecost Sunday to the time of the Annunciation…

“So when we find them on Pentecost Sunday they’re still locked together in an upper room. It’s not until the Holy Spirit comes down upon them that they receive the courage and strength the fortitude, the perseverance and interestingly we are told in confirmation, in the sacrament of confirmation, the gift of reverence. That’s the gift that Mary received when the Holy Spirit came upon her. Henceforth nothing would again be casual or small. Everything with light invested overspilled with terror and divinity. So the apostles received that same gift of reverence…”

The Sisters of Life wear a medal of the Madonna of the Streets. On the back of the medal is inscribed the words “and nothing would again be casual or small,” a line from a poem by Father John Duffy on the Annunciation, The words speak of the moment that Christ came into the world and changed everything! He is the light that shines in the darkness!

“Once Mary conceived the Word beneath her heart, she comes to recognize as never before that not one thing had its being but through Him…nothing will ever again be casual or small, but everything with light invested…”

This mystery is meant to be carried out in us, the mystical Body of Christ. As Mary and the Apostles received the Holy Spirit, we can call on the same Holy Spirit to enlighten us and show us Jesus, growing in our hearts. We can utter our “fiats” many times through the day and His light will grow within us until we become so transparent that His light bursts through and touches the lives of those we meet. We nurture Him within us through prayer, little sacrifices, and especially through gratitude. When we receive Christ in the Eucharist, we carry him ‘beneath our hearts’ just as Our Blessed Mother carried Christ beneath her heart. By regularly receiving the sacraments, especially the sacrament of the Eucharist, we are strengthened and we come to see with the eyes of Christ, with His heart. The extraordinary is found in the ordinary.

What a wonderful season is Advent, the expectation, the silence, the growth. May we all be touched by the Holy Spirit and come to see that “nothing would again be casual or small.”

PS - The SOL make the best chocolate covered toffee I've ever eaten - even vbetter than I've had in England. If you have an opportunity to go to the Advent reception (a grand "thank you" celebration for all their helpers great & small) trays of it will be passed. Eat as much of it as possible. At this point, I don't think they sell it - though I hope I'm wrong. It's amazingly delicious.

The Kingdom of Heaven Must Be Among Us

2009-11-29T00:26:00.000-05:00

I've been ill most of today but eventually felt up to checking my email and found one asking me to take a survey which involved reading some comments on a discussion forum. It seemsed harmless enough so I gave it a whirl and quickly paged through the comments only to encounter one that made me stop and realize it was time to begin to say some of the things that have come up for me during 40 Days for Freedom. What follows is the email that I wrote as a result. (NOTE: ital = quotes from Ms. Newman's site; bold = issues that stood out for me.)

We must accept that worshipping God in holiness and righteousness in this unique place is both a political* as well as spiritual issue because we are both citizens of a particular state and of the Kingdom of Heaven. Just as we cannot separate our bodies and souls, we cannot choose between our citizenship in both earth and the Kingdom of Heaven. As long as we live on earth and follow Christ, we will be citizens of both. And here, in this particular place, of all the places on earth, God has given us the grace to worship Him freely. And that matters! To us, personally and also to the world as a whole.

In a world convinced that He has forgotten us, a world filled with despair, the USA proclaims that the Kingdom of Heaven is actually coming into being. We are a visible, physical place that others long for because they long for freedom but true freedom is following Christ and only here can we even begin to follow Him with our bodies and minds and souls. Here, in this place, we can be evidence that Christ's freedom is real. Not perfectly - it's still earth - but perhaps just enough.

* Political: of citizens or the state, civil, civic

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms. Newman -

I'm concerned about some of the things I've read on your site and wanted to bring them to your attention (in no particular order).

I ask my minority friends, how do you think that $318 million dollars could have improved your life in East St. Louis? I stand before you, to ask for your vote and support in this election — not your money — just your VOTE on November 2, 2010. The Democrats have USED YOUR SUPPORT TO STAY IN POWER AND ENRICH THEMSELVES AT YOUR EXPENSE, while at the same time, allowing your living conditions to continue to get worse. Is there ANY WAY I could POSSIBLY do less for you that the Democrats have done for you in the last 30 years?

One of the biggest problems that exists in US govt is this doing things for us. Americans are supposed to be a self-governing, self-supporting people who do things for themselves at the local level and send representatives to State & Local Assembles/Congress/the White House/etc to serve us. The service is limited by the US and State Constitutions. The worst thing any politician can do is tell us that he/she is going to do things for us.

The America of today is not the America of my childhood. Our problems have become more complicated, and our ability to solve them has diminished markedly. Our country needs NEW leaders. The culture of corruption that has taken over our nation’s Capitol is a threat to all of us. Honesty and integrity in government has gone by the wayside as our elected officials serve only those with money to spend, and who can buy whatever they want from our legislators and leave the rest of us to pay the bill.

WE are the ones who are paying the outrageous taxes brought on by the exceedingly poor management of our tax dollars. Government waste has gone far beyond outrageous. Government corruption is a rotting, bloated cow that will poison all of us if we do nothing and IT MUST STOP!! The trillions of dollars that are being wasted, spent on bailouts, bailouts that were opposed by the voters who were IGNORED by our so-called REPRESENTATIVES, have put our country in terrible jeopardy.

It should be against the law to vote on a bill that you have not read. Would you personally sign a contract that you yourself have not read? No, of course not!! Why then, should it be OK to vote on a bill, representing your constituents, that you haven’t read, that will spend millions, if not billions of OUR tax money? That’s not representation, that’s malfeasance of office ... and JERRY COSTELLO SUPPORTED THE BAILOUT AND VOTED FOR IT!!

We will never have the America of our childhoods but the founding fathers gave us (all the citizens of the US) the tools to solve the problems we face. Again, it's not a matter of leadership because we lead ourselves. It's a matter of doing it on the local level and govt is involved as little as possible. It's not that our tax $$ have been badly spent, it's not even the failure to read the bills (though that's important), it's that we are being taxed on every level and govt thinks it can take from us whenever it pleases. Representatives/servants, on the other hand, do the job they've taken on and must really convince us to allow them to spend any of our money. we need no new leaders but willing servants/representatives. With leaders, we have people telling us what to do. With reps/servants, we determine what to do.

What do you think is going to happen to us when the COMMUNIST CHINESE stop buying our debt? Think about that for just a minute

I wish politicians would think about this issue. I wish they would also realize that if they get out of the way, Americans can figure out ways to pay down the debt and go from being a borrowing nation to one that lends. The same is true about healthcare - we can figure it out.

Overall, we need the minimum amount of govt interference. We need reps/servants who will actually work on dismantling the Unconstitutional megalith our govt has become. We need to return responsibility to the states, enforce our immigration laws and control our borders, support our friends and stand up to our enemies and be clear on which is which - we need to realize that the country that came into being because we wanted to worship God in freedom still exists and be that country.

I am looking for reps/servants to support for 2010 throughout the country. I will give my $$ to those who convince me that they will actually represent me. I haven't got a great deal but there are many like me and together, we've got the ability to take this country back. If you want our support, please take a good look at the language you use (we will believe what you say - we've been taught that lesson well) and most importantly, discover what we actually want. Your site, while discussing some very important issues, represents more nanny govt. We're adults. We do it for ourselves. We'd be proud to help you serve us if that's the job you believe you've been given. But take an honest assessment of yourself: if you're a do-gooder with a plan or even just the determination to fix things for us, please don't run. Too many of those in office today began that way. We don't need more. I'll be following your campaign.

Drusilla Barron

PS - I'll have Pt II of Abby Johnson's story in a day or two. God bless.

I've Added a Donation Button

2009-11-27T12:36:00.000-05:00

I'm going onto permanent disability and for the next several weeks, I shall be going through some financially tight times. So I've decided to add a donate button. I have no doubt God will care for all my needs - He always has. And this might be one way He chooses to do so. If you feel so inclined, I'd appreciate any donations you'd care to make. Thanks. Drusilla

40 Days For Freedom: Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-26T10:39:00.000-05:00

God of light and life's creation,
reigning over all supreme,
daunting our imagination,
prospect glorious yet unseen:
Lord, whom earth and heaven obey,
turn towards this house today!

God of justice in our nation,
Fearing neither rich nor strong,
Granting truth its vidication,
Passing sentence on all wrong:
Lord, by whom we die or live,
Hear, and as you hear, forgive.

God the Father, Son, and Spirit,
Trinity of love and grace,
Through your mercy we inherit
Word and worship in this place:
Let our children all their days
To this house return with praise!*

I encountered this hymn for the first time this morning during my morning prayers and thought it sums up the prayers we are presenting to the Lord during these forty days. And then I read a meditation by Fr. Richard Veras in the magazine, Magnificat and wanted to share a portion of it as well:

"Our sense of our unworthiness is not something to shun or ignore or get over. It is the very thing that allows us to experience wonder before the unimaginable gratuitousness of God. A culture that convinces us that we are the ones who independently make things happen in our lives and we are the ones who deserve all the credit for our accomplishments is a culture that attempts to rob us of God by eclipsing him behind our self-afirmation.

"This Thanksgiving let us go even deeper into the awareness that Someone is loving us. Let us be thankful for the very fact that we are chosen: chosen to exist, chosen to be baptized, chosen to know Christ in our lives. Why should God have chosen us? The less able we are to answer that question the more able we are to live a profoundly joyful thanksgiving."

I do not think it a coincidence that so many came to this land seeking a place to worship God in holiness and righteousness, to worship God in peace. I believe that that desire and our living out of it, even in slipshod, inept fashion as is often the case, have, along with the rule of law, made this the land it is: this is not Latin America. Yes there is poverty here but not the sort that is found just south of our borders. One of the greatest mistakes Americans make is to romanticize Latin America. There is great beauty in those countries but also great institutionalized corruptions and extreme, habitual cruelty. America is unique and we can either give thanks to God for His great gift - or not.

May God bless us all and teach us all to love Him and give Him the praise, honour and gratitude due Him. Have a blessed Thanksgiving day.

* © Michael A. Perry

The Gates of Hell

2009-11-22T02:53:00.000-05:00

"Hear this, O foolish and senseless people,
who have eyes, but see not,
who have ears, but hear not.
Do you not fear me? says the LORD;
Do you not tremble before me?
I placed the sand as the bound for the sea,
a perpetual barrier which it cannot pass;
though the waves toss, they cannot prevail,
though they roar, they cannot pass over it.
But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart;
they have turned aside and gone away.
They do not say in their hearts,
`Let us fear the LORD our God,
who gives the rain in its season,
the autumn rain and the spring rain,
and keeps for us
the weeks appointed for the harvest.'
Your iniquities have turned these away,
and your sins have kept good from you.
For wicked men are found among my people;
they lurk like fowlers lying in wait.
They set a trap;
they catch men.
Like a basket full of birds,
their houses are full of treachery;
therefore they have become great and rich,
they have grown fat and sleek.
They know no bounds in deeds of wickedness;
they judge not with justice
the cause of the fatherless, to make it prosper,
and they do not defend the rights of the needy.
Shall I not punish them for these things? says the LORD,
and shall I not avenge myself
on a nation such as this?"
An appalling and horrible thing
has happened in the land:
the prophets prophesy falsely,
and the priests rule at their direction;
my people love to have it so,
but what will you do when the end comes? (Jeremiah 5:21-31)

What do we do when the end comes? What do we do when we’ve been pushed to the very edge and don’t know the only way out? Isn’t that the fear we avoid facing for as long as possible, all our lives if we’re “lucky”? And isn’t that the current word on the street that most of us hear?

The end is very near.

There’s no way out.

It’s hopeless.

I was recently privileged to meet Abby Johnson the young woman who quit her job as director of Planned Parenthood in Bryan, TX. One of the many things she had to say is that PP employees are brainwashed to believe that they will not be able to get another job elsewhere once they work for PP because “they do abortions.” They are told that there is nowhere to go. Told only PP cares about them. To find a church to attend, Abby herself had to change denominations because she worked for PP. Then the day came when she knew she could not stay any longer. And she found herself begging God, What can I do? Where can I go?

I have taken the phrase “Storming the Gates of Hell” as a sort of tag line for the Forty Days for Freedom movement. After reading and hearing all the “Be afraid! Be very afraid!” posts and emails and admonitions, it seems appropriate. A couple of years ago, Fallen Sparrow pointed out to me that in regards to “upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”* we must remember who is attacking whom. When presented with that passage, whether from Catholic, Baptist or Anglican perspectives, the message was always that (cue deep scary voice) the Gates of Hell were attacking but don’t worry, they won’t overcome us. Ultimately, though many might fall in battle (including my family), (cue deep scary voice) the Gates of Hell would themselves be overcome. But on that day, Fallen Sparrow told me that the Church was supposed to be on the attack against those huge, more horrific than the Black Gates of Mordor , nightmare gates that I knew were really out to crush me and that got me thinking about what gates are and what they do.

Gates allow access into and out of an enclosed place. If gates are to prevail, they can only do so by being inaccessible, unassailable. Either one can’t get in or one can’t escape. If the construction is bad or enough of the wall is destroyed, gates may fall down. But as for attacking – that has more to do with the really bad horror movies I saw as a kid than reality. Gates don’t attack. They look scary. They look impregnable. Still, in any heavily fortified enclosure gates, as the Witch King of Angmar realizes, are always the weakest point. So, the weakest point of hell will not prevail against Christ’s Church. Hmmmm. In a flash I knew I’d had it backwards. There were no ominous Gates out to get me but merely my fertile and wounded imagination working overtime. And as for the real gates of hell…

On the day Abby Johnson asked God what to do and where to go, she looked out the window and saw two women who had come to pray for women having abortions and for those who work in the abortion industry.** They were a familiar sight. People came to pray whenever abortions were being performed. She got in her car and drove two houses down the street to the Campaign for Life office where she was welcomed with great joy. (To be continued.)

* Matthew 16:18 (Taken from the King James Version. I’d be happy to discuss my translation choice if anyone so desires. You may email me or leave a comment.)

** Abortion is an industry and I will address that further n the next part of Abby’s story.

Now Thank We All Our God

2009-11-20T00:07:00.000-05:00

I believe that our prayers and sacrifices are making a difference. I believe that our elected representatives are speaking up and representing us. I believe we have reason to hope. I believe we are doing the work necessary to become citizens who thank God first:

Fallen Sparrow & I had lunch w/ a mutual friend today. FS & I said let's say grace & our friend was pleasantly surprised and joined us in saying grace at a public restaurant in front of all those people. Perhaps he'll suggest grace next time and get into the habit of saying grace at every meal.

What if we do that next? What if we say grace before every meal whether in public or private (but especially in public)? I understand that might be difficult for some who have business meals but it still might be possible. And if it is possible, if we can be a nucleus of people who encourage others to thank God by thanking Him ourselves, wouldn't that be lovely?

What do you all think?

What Kind of People?

2009-11-14T00:45:00.000-05:00

Between twitter hackers and computer excitement (hd wiped out - lost everything) and two (2) new roommates moving in at about the same time, it has been an amazingly busy several days with little time for writing but perhaps that's not so bad. Thoughts have had free flow and I'm beginning to know what I want to say.

Often, I find myself radically at odds with the world around me. There is that which is obviously wrong and that which is almost going in the right direction but is off, just enough, so that it's obvious it will not reach the goal. And then there is that which has no real goal in mind but only likes to be with the "winning" team. I certainly have no patent on all or much of anything that is right. All I have is what I might call an interior compass that pokes at me when things are off and it's been poking and jabbing a lot recently. We know there are some major problems in our country and can delineate what many of those problems are. But those problems are too often with others and not with ourselves. And that's deadly. Because even if we do "fix" the problems within our government and schools and families we will have only replaced one set of problems with another; joyless puritanism could easily replace sterile licentiousness in our culture.

In my current reading of the Bible as if it is one book (and I didn't even skip through the Wisdom of Solomon - a dreary read), I am in the midst of Isaiah, "the Book of Consolation," which consists of the chapters numbered 40 and higher. God's people, who have been in exile, are coming home. When I studied the Book of Isaiah, exile had come as a result of Israel's failure to care for widows and orphans and the strangers in their midst. Studying under Anglicans in the mid 1990s, Isaiah was a book about the results of social justice first and then idolatry. Certainly both are central themes but this time I discovered another theme that permeates the book and cannot be escaped: Israel's lack of gratitude. It is their failure to thank God that leads them to idolatry: Israel must be grateful to the living God so as to withstand the immense temptations to idolatry that surrounded them in every other country and culture. It is their failure to thank God that leads them to social injustice: Israel must be grateful to God so as to remember that they came from no people and God has made them His people, that they were once wanderers in need of help and God helped them. Unless Israel remains mindful that all they are and have comes from God, unless Israel is faithful in thanking God, they will return to idolatry and social injustice and exile.

The Civil War was fought to determine whether the Union would be preserved. We are in a war now, not to preserve our Union but to determine what kind of people we will be. Thus far, this war has been dramatically different and I beg you to plead with God that it continue without anymore violence than we have already experienced. This country has much in common with pre-exilic Israel. We were founded as a place to worship God in peace. Our Constitution and our laws exist so as to prevent governemnt from interfering with us worshiping God.* How we worship HIm varies to a greater or lesser extent depending upon our religious faith, but even the founding fathers would have admonished us to thank God at all times and in all ways. To thank Him for preserving us. To thank Him for endowing us with such bounty. To thank Him for giving us a home where we can worship Him in peace. And if we are to win this war, I mean really win it, we must become The People Who Thank God. Though the world think us crazy, we must thank God. Whatever the cost, we must thank God. Regardless our denominations and other differences, we must thank God.

Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you; for when he was but one I called him, and I blessed him and made him many.
For the LORD will comfort Zion; he will comfort all her waste places, and will make her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the LORD; joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song.
"Listen to me, my people, and give ear to me, my nation; for a law will go forth from me, and my justice for a light to the peoples.
My deliverance draws near speedily, my salvation has gone forth, and my arms will rule the peoples; the coastlands wait for me, and for my arm they hope.
Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath; for the heavens will vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment, and they who dwell in it will die like gnats; but my salvation will be for ever, and my deliverance will never be ended.
"Hearken to me, you who know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law; fear not the reproach of men, and be not dismayed at their revilings.
For the moth will eat them up like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool; but my deliverance will be for ever, and my salvation to all generations." (Isaiah 51:2-8)

* It is silly to imagine that the founding fathers would have had any patience with the argument that what is worshipping God to one person is, to another, a woman's right to choose and that the latter must take precedent. The founding fathers were steeped in Natural Law: any woman who sought to kill her own child would have been considered, at best, mad, at worst, possessed.

Making A Name for Oneself

2009-11-08T02:46:00.000-05:00

When he encounters death, Gilgamesh, the tragic hero of the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest pieces of literature man has written, realizes there is only one thing to do, make a name for himself while he is here on earth. So the great Sumerian king builds cities and monuments so that even though he will die, he will not be forgotten. This idea of making a name for oneself is one of those things that accompanies being human; when human history begins, we are concerned, even consumed with this desire to continue even after death.

In Genesis this human desire is addressed in a profoundly different way: Abraham is convinced he will have no heir since Sarah, his wife, is barren. But God promises that Sarah will, in fact, bear him a son, that Abraham's name will be known for all times, that he will be the father of a great nation, that they will be a light to all the nations. Here, for the first time, we see how God responds to the human desire to make a name for ourselves.

The House of Representatives passed the Pelosi-Reid healthcare bill this evening even though three Democrat congressional leaders said they could not guarantee the amendments to prevent funding abortions would be in the final bill on which the Senate will vote. They passed it even though it provides for "end of life care" (death panels) and governmental oversight of medical decisions and jail time for those who choose not to participate and the wholesale distribution of suffering and death. They passed it knowing it is bad law. They passed it knowing it is unconstitutional law. They passed it knowing it is illegal and wrong.

Many of our elected officials have promised to fundamentally change healthcare in the United States. They have promised to redistribute wealth by taking our money and giving it to others as an act of law, without our consent. They have promised to fundamentally change the United States itself. These people have promised to make names for themselves. Names that will outlast their deaths. Names that will go down in history and never be forgotten.

When we are baptized into the Body of Christ, the promise Isaiah speaks is fulfilled: God writes our names on the palms of His hands. We need no longer make names for ourselves. That job is done. In Christ, we are given a Name we cannot create for ourselves. We are called as Christ's own forever; we are given Christ's Name for our very own.

We must respond to the House of Representatives. This must not go unaddressed. But we must also stop to consider that many of those politicians who voted to harm us, to harm the sick and elderly, to slaughter infants in their mother's wombs and to use our money to pay for it all are Christians and all of them are children of God. They do not leave off being Christians because they refuse to follow Christ. They do not leave off being Christian because they choose to follow their own way. Baptism cannot be undone. But we can choose damnation.

And so we must look at this and remember, choosing damnation means that we do not see that our names written on the palms of God's hands. Choosing damnation means we are left alone, desperately trying to make names for ourselves. We either accept the Name of Christ or we erect filthy monuments on the backs of slaves and infants and the weak. One may look back and say, I made that. But the monuments we construct to ourselves are ugly and destructive.

Please, please, please pray that those who voted for this bill that they know will cause great harm will hear that God is calling them by name; pray that they will repent. Pray for this nation, pray for those who are frenetically embroiled in trying to make names for themselves. And pray for those who seek to follow Christ, to accept the Name that is above every name. Pray that we will be faithful and will endure until the end.

40 Days for Freedom: A Post I'd Rather Not Write

2009-11-07T04:49:00.000-05:00

I have no photos of my mother. She died when I was so young. I survived with my life, with the clothes on my back - alone, abandoned, left in God's care. And God has done well. God has done very well. I might be a bitter, cruel woman intent on exacting revenge on a world that stole so much from me. Instead I am happy, joyous, full of life and wonder and gratitude. I know God loves me. I know people love me. I know my parents' faith was not in vain; my legacy is Christ Himself and He has been, is, will always be everything they wanted for me and so much more.

But sometimes, especially since my health has declined, I miss them. I miss them so much. I miss Marmar in particular. There are days I just barely drag myself through and I wish she was here with me. There are nights, such as tonight, when I can't sleep and I long for her presence. Several years ago, a friend gave me a Madonna and Child medal that I wore on a silver chain about my neck. When I felt nervous or lonely, I fingered it. Sometimes friends would glance over at me and see it balanced on my nose - I don't know why I'd do that, I just did. It comforted me and actually did remind me of my mother. I no longer have that medal.

Yesterday I went to D.C. After the rally, we were invited to stop by our representative's offices and I wanted to pay a visit to Nancy Pelosi. Many others did as well and I found myself straggling along behind several new friends. As I walked, I felt I wanted to give her something and wished I had brought a Miraculous Medal for her. Then I remembered the medal around my neck. At first I was appalled to think of giving it to her. But then I knew, she really needs a mother far more than I do. So I decided if I got in and if there was an opportunity, I'd give it to her.

We weren't allowed to just go into the Speaker's office. We were told to keep against the right wall and wait; she wasn't accepting visitors. Some said they wanted us to go away but we had come to visit her and weren't leaving. When told we could leave notes for the Speaker on a table, we began to write. I asked one of the many armed guards if I might leave the speaker a gift? I showed them my medal and asked if she would get it. They were hesitant. My new friends said she wouldn't appreciate it. But I asked, does she need it? They replied, Yes. Yes, she did need it. I wrote my note and waited.

Finally they allowed us to go into the office four at a time and sign the guestbook. When it was my turn, I asked the young man behind the desk if I the Speaker would receive the medal. He said he'd take it and pass it on. His demeanor was one of disdain, distance. Someone said the staff hadn't been prepared for this and I quite believed it just looking at that young man's closed demeanor. I took off my medal, handed it to him and told him about losing my mother and being given the medal as a reminder but that I thought Speaker Pelosi needed a mother more than I did. I asked him to tell her about it.

She does need it. She so badly needs it. I miss my medal, it's abscence is a searing pain. But neither Marmar's nor Our Blessed Mother's love are in that medal. I miss only an accustomed reminder. But what does Nancy Pelosi miss? How hard her heart must be?

I keep thinking and having the impression that she doesn't care, that she no longer values her soul. I keep having the impression that the thing to do is let her and those like her go the way they've chosen; to leave them to God's mercy and give my energy to those who simply don't know what to do in this bizarro world version of the United States.

Fasting means going without. It's been pretty easy for me to go without that chocolate as long as I don't think about it. It is not so easy to forget my medal; I feel exposed. But if that's what it takes to become the kind of person who does her part to care for the immense gift God has given me as a citizen of the United States, then I'll fast from my medal.

And I remain a hopeful beast: I'll hope God uses it to touch some person's life. Our Mother is exceedingly capable and the Sacred Heart is on the back of the medal so it's just chock full of reminders, of powerful blasts of God's love. And the Holy Father blessed it when he came to New York so there's even more powerful goodness waiting to call someone, maybe many someones back to life.

"Lord God, have mercy on what you have fashioned, have mercy on the children of men, have mercy on you own image." from the Apocalypse of Paul (4th Century)

Help Draw the Line: No Tax $ for Abortions!

2009-11-04T23:01:00.027-05:00

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
3211 FOURTH STREET NE  WASHINGTON DC 20017-1194  202-541-3100  FAX 202-541-3166

USCCB NATIONWIDE BULLETIN INSERT
Tell Congress: Remove Abortion Funding & Mandates from Needed Health Care Reform
Congress is preparing to debate health care reform legislation on the House and Senate floors.
Genuine health care reform should protect the life and dignity of all people from the moment of
conception until natural death. The U.S. bishops’ conference has concluded that all committeeapproved
bills are seriously deficient on the issues of abortion and conscience, and do not provide
adequate access to health care for immigrants and the poor. The bills will have to change or the
bishops have pledged to oppose them.
Our nation is at a crossroads. Policies adopted in health care reform will have an impact for good or
ill for years to come. None of the bills retains longstanding current policies against abortion funding
or abortion coverage mandates, and none fully protects conscience rights in health care.
As the U.S. bishops’ letter of October 8 states:
“No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion. It is essential that the
legislation clearly apply to this new program longstanding and widely supported federal
restrictions on abortion funding and mandates, and protections for rights of conscience.
No current bill meets this test…. If acceptable language in these areas cannot be found,
we will have to oppose the health care bill vigorously.”
For the full text of this letter and more information on proposed legislation and the bishops’ advocacy
for authentic health care reform, visit: www.usccb.org/healthcare.
Congressional leaders are attempting to put together final bills for floor consideration. Please contact
your Representative and Senators today and urge them to fix these bills with the pro-life amendments
noted below. Otherwise much needed health care reform will have to be opposed. Health care reform
should be about saving lives, not destroying them.
ACTION: Contact Members through e-mail, phone calls or FAX letters.
 To send a pre-written, instant e-mail to Congress go to www.usccb.org/action.
 Call the U.S. Capitol switchboard at: 202-224-3121, or call your Members’ local offices.
 Full contact info can be found on Members’ web sites at House of Reprsentaties & senate
MESSAGE to SENATE:
“During floor debate on the health care reform bill, please support an amendment to
incorporate longstanding policies against abortion funding and in favor of conscience rights.
If these serious concerns are not addressed, the final bill should be opposed.”
MESSAGE to HOUSE:
“Please support the Stupak Amendment that addresses essential pro-life concerns on abortion
funding and conscience rights in the health care reform bill. Help ensure that the Rule for the
bill allows a vote on this amendment. If these serious concerns are not addressed, the final bill
should be opposed.”
WHEN: Both House and Senate are preparing for floor votes now. Act today! Thank you!

Day Six of 40 Days for Freedom - More Questions

2009-11-04T11:56:00.000-05:00

Henry asks, "How can we who claim to love Christ not love what He loves?" That's my question too. And, like any five year-old, I have more questions:

Is it coincidence that so many groups of people came to this country to worship God freely? Is it a coincidence that Maryland was founded by Catholics who wanted to worship God freely? Is it a coincidence that Rhode Island and Pennsylvania and Massachucetts and New Jersey - in fact the original thirteen colonies were settled as "plantations of religion" or "holy experiments" or by entrpreneurs who worked to promote the prosperity of the church? Was the Holy Spirit doing something? Was God perhaps bringing His children together for some purpose? And if so, as their heirs, have we any responsibilities today?

Perhaps I should just ask the obvious question: does Christ love our nation?* And if so, are we required to love what He loves?

In this video, Rep. Foxx speaks of reasons for us to be afraid. I'm not suggesting we should be afraid of anything except the damnation of our souls. I do ask, does this matter to us as Christians? Does it matter in terms of loving what Christ loves?

* This question is not asking, does Christ only love our nation and no other? Nor is it suggesting that if Christ loves our nation then we never commit sins or make mistakes or foul things up. It's simply asking if Christ loves our nation.

** I'm off to DC because Pelosi's HC bill is more than a tax hike. It's a means to distribute death and suffering amongst us all. Pray for me. I'll keep you all in my prayers.

A Query for Day Five of Forty Days for Freedom

2009-11-03T21:41:00.000-05:00

I have a serious query: How can we hope to love the City of God if we don't love and cherish this city, where God has placed us now? Is it even necessary to love and cherish this city? Is loving and cherishing this city incompatible with longing for the City of God?

I'd love any answers, reflections, thoughts, ideas on this. There is the question Jesus asks, if we are not faithful in small matters how can we be faithful in large? Is that applicable?

Thanks for pondering this question with me.

PS - I'm heading down to DC tomorrow to join Thursday's peaceful protest against the Pelosi HC "reform" bill. Please pray for me, particularly since it's been a rough two weeks: searching for a new roommate and not feeling at all well. But I think, if I can make it, I must.

More Joy In Heaven Over One Repentant Sinner...

2009-11-02T22:20:00.004-05:00

...so let us rejoice here on earth too!

Consider This - Seriously

2009-11-02T10:59:00.000-05:00

Day Three of 40 Days for Freedom

2009-11-01T23:49:00.004-05:00

It has been a long day Three of 40 Days for Freedom, much of it quite lovely though exhausting, and I'm squeaking in just under the wire. I'm making this post because it speaks to why 40 Days for Freedom is so important. What actually does happen if people just walk away? What if people say, No, I will not participate any longer? What if we close ourselves off from each other?

When I think of the work we are asking God to prepare us for, that is it. That we will say Yes! That we will continue to engage and hope and struggle through these difficult times, these times that so many find so dark. We know, wherever our Lord is, darkness is not dark to him, the night is as bright as rhe day. The question is, will we share that fact with those who don't know? With those who are growing more and more despondent?

Day Two of Forty Days for Freedom

2009-10-31T13:11:00.000-04:00

This clip is important whether or not one political. In fact, I don't see any difference between the political and spiritual. The spiritual warfare we fight has been on the physical plain since the Garden and was consumated on the Cross. We battle powers and principalities who use wicked men and women to kill infants and the sick and elderly, who use wicked men and women to try to take from us our freedom to worship God in holiness and righteousness.

So I recommend this clip and if you feel so moved, join us in Washington, DC this Thursday, Nov. 5th at noon. Wouldn't it be awesome if a group of us descended on the Capitol and prayed for our nation and for ourselves, that we might cherish the gift that God has given us, that He might heal us. If I'm well enough, I'll be there.

Day One of Forty Days

2009-10-30T18:07:00.000-04:00

It is my intent to post each day for the next forty days. Today, I have been writing a post on prayer but can't get it ready before the end of the day. I may not like the feel of it but I must obey reality as much as everyone else. My joints aren't at all happy and I am terribly, terribly tired. God tends to take as He please from me, so perhaps this is the way He wants me to spend day one.*

Oh, and for those who haven't done so, I want to recommend my post on hope. Enduring, I'll stick with you no matter where you take me sort of hope is what we need.

Meanwhile know that I am praying and fasting and soon, resting for the remainder of the day. We'll see what tomorrow brings. God bless us all.

*It's certainly my pleasure and my honour that God does so. I belong to Him, what else would I want?

God Gave Us The Freedom to Laugh Too!

2009-10-29T16:57:00.000-04:00

Just click and be joyful!

How Do We Even Begin to Decide Whom To Act As Our Representatives

2009-10-29T14:56:00.000-04:00

So many Catholics and other Christians fail to interact in the public forum. But when power is vested in the citizens, the public forum is the primary place in which government occurs; we cannot expect a representative govenment to be responsive to us if we remain silent. And, we cannot expect a representative government to be responsive to us if we limit our interchange to those who are like us: those who belong to my faith, those who belong to my particular tradition within my faith. We can only keep the freedom to worship God if we actually participate across all levels of society. We must do real things in the real world such as speak our minds. The Internet is a powerful tool for doing so, if we know how to use it. So here's a question:

Poll: Would You Support Jim Demint for President if Nominated by the GOP in 2012?

Please vote based on what you know of Jim DeMint. If you don't know who Sen. DeMint is, here is his site site which includes videos of his speeches before the Senate and the press. Also, read his voting record (just scroll down). He's impressive on life issues and conservative issues in general.

Please click the link and vote yes or no. The poll is anonymous and is only being used amongst a few bloggers to determine the amount of support there is for Senator DeMint.

Fasting: Why Not Give Up A Food

2009-10-28T11:57:00.025-04:00

After air and water, food is the first, most basic thing we need in order to survive. Most of us love it, and well we should. Jesus describes the Kingdom of Heaven as a feast. In the developed world, most of us do not understand the power the word feast conveys. But if you’ve ever been hungry, you do.

When I was a girl there were locks on the food cupboards and refrigerator. Eating food was a crime except when, what and in the amount my foster-father determined. Until I began working at the age of twelve, I was hungry most of the time. Having a sick digestive tract made it all the worse because I often vomited and so lost what I ate. The only snack I was offered was raw apples. I just happen to be one of those rare people who are allergic to raw apples, they cause me to have asthma attacks. But my foster-father didn’t believe in allergies, at least not for me, so I gave my apple to one of my foster brothers. Vomiting meant I should “rest my stomach” so I was given two saltine crackers and a cup of clear broth.

You must understand, when I say I was hungry, I don’t mean I was politely interested in food, I was terribly, terribly hungry with a swollen stomach and thin limbs. I was very underweight, couldn’t sleep, had headaches all the time, was anaemic. I tried to feed myself by making pancakes by adding water to the flour and salt that were left out in canisters on the counter – without butter or oil, they just stuck to the pan in lumps. On those rare occasions that the cookie jar was left on the counter, I’d try to take just one or two so there wouldn’t be a noticeable diminution but always found myself sneaking back and eating as many as I could – once or twice, nearly the entire jar.* A few times I found the pantry unlocked and was mesmerized by all the food. It was beautiful and I always spent a few moments just looking at it and smelling it. You’d be amazed at how wonderful a raw potato smells or how delicious a hard green banana can be. Once I ate an entire tin of tomato aspic because, for some reason, I thought it would be the least missed item. But finding a jar of cookies left on the counter or the pantry unlocked were rare so I usually ate dry dog food. It was the only food kept in an unlocked cupboard. When my foster-mother found some in my pocket, I told her I was using it to train the dog. I even created an advertising campaign in my mind: Crispy Treats! Packed with nutrition and flavour! I could never come up with a jingle though.

When I did begin working, I spent a good amount of what I earned on food for myself and my foster-siblings. There were many lunch and ice cream cone treats. I bought snacks. And I ate – sausages on a roll, pastrami sandwiches, Hostess pies and Snowballs, candy bars, avocados, corn chips, bananas – food, amazing food. And, after my foster-mother died, for a year or so, when I was Cinderella, I was given the keys to the food cupboard and expected to keep the food safe. It is only now that I have begun to realize how horrid that was. The cruelty of giving me keys to the food and expecting me to remain hungry and to allow my foster-siblings to go hungry is unspeakable. I had reason to loathe them, to despise them, but not to starve them, just to wish they’d go away and leave me alone.

There was always plenty of food. Each day, we’d watch my foster-father eat whatever he wanted. He’d regularly bring home donuts and cake and all sorts of goodies for himself and his wife. But only small amounts of them trickled down to us. After my foster mother died, there were times when my foster-father would leave on business trips without having done the marketing. There would be no food in the house and we didn’t know when he would return. But the lack wasn’t a lack of money. It was a failure to use his money to feed us. When he left us alone, my foster brothers stole food and eventually, so did I. I went shopping. Put food in the basket just as if I was making a regular shopping trip and then bagged it in an unwatched corner. After bagging, I’d push the cart to the back and ask to use the lavatory. The manager would graciously watch my groceries. I’d spend the time in the toilet begging God not to be caught. Then I’d come out, thank the manager and take my groceries home.

I tell you this bit from my childhood to stimulate your own elemental needs and longings for food. Food is beautiful. Very beautiful. So why not give some favourite bit of beautiful food up? Giving up food is the usual meaning of the concept of fasting. It would be foolish, with no preparation, to go on a juice or water fast. But what about giving up one favourite food? Coffee or orange juice or your morning muffin or dessert? Those who are sick should be very careful about giving up food. Instead, we can perhaps substitute some food that has the same nutrition for a food that we love or forego a treat we don’t need. (I’ve decided to freeze the huge slab of chocolate I got for my birthday – I can wait 40 days to finish eating it.)

So that’s my suggestion for today. Plan to give up a food. Doing so is a way of clearing a path within our selves for the Lord. We are so separated from our bodies – there are too many of us who live in fantastic worlds generated in our own minds, worlds with no connection with the real world God has made. Such are the people who would deprive us of freedom. But we aren’t deprived. We can choose to give up some food to help us make way for the kind of hunger that we need. Because we do need to be hungry – for freedom, the freedom God has provided us by giving us citizenship in this country, the freedom to worship Him in holiness and righteousness. We must be as hungry for freedom as the pilgrims, as our founding fathers, as Christ Himself: Didn’t he die for our freedom?

[I]f my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. (2 Chronicles 7:14)

* Please don’t think for one moment that I was a good little girl and ‘fessed up to my thefts. When the shout rang out, “Who ate all the cookies!” I kept my mouth closed and allowed one of my foster siblings to take the blame and the punishment.

40 Days For Freedom

2009-10-27T19:43:00.000-04:00

At the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen from December 7 through December 18, a treaty will be offered, in which signatories cede their sovereignty to a world government, one that does not yet exist and for which we will have no vote. First, and remember this, this is the United States so President Obama's signature is not enough to cede sovereignty, the treaty must be ratified by two-thirds of both houses of Congress. So we won’t immediately find ourselves ruled by the U.N. But his signature would send the message that many Americans actually want world government, that many of us want to give up governing ourselves and be governed by U.N. committees that we aren’t allowed to elect.

We live in a republic. It’s not a democracy though we do have a representative form of government. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a republic as a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law. We hold the supreme power. We govern ourselves. Our elected officials and representatives serve us. We, ourselves, are responsible for our public lives (and private too) within the boundaries of the Constitution of the United States of America. Though Catholics (and other Christians) are taught to obey the state, what do we do when we are the state? The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us:

1915 As far as possible citizens should take an active part in public life. The manner of this participation may vary from one country or culture to another. "One must pay tribute to those nations whose systems permit the largest possible number of the citizens to take part in public life in a climate of genuine freedom."(1)

We live in the nation where “the largest possible number of the citizens [] take part in public life in a climate of genuine freedom.” That’s the gift God has given American citizens. And we are responsible to Him for what we do with this gift. We must decide whether we will be the light of the world, [a] city set on a hill or if we will set our light under a bushel. We must decide if we will let all see []our good works and give glory to []our Father who is in heaven. This is a Catholic issue. This is a Baptist issue. It is a Methodist and Evangelical and Non-denominational issue. This is a Christian issue. This is an issue of what we are in our very essence, creatures whose work is to glorify God.

We are in a time of great anxiety and fear: there is much corruption in both parties; we are governed by bullies and thugs, by the greedy and the selfish and the envious. In fact, the exceptions are those who humbly serve us. Along with the freedom God has given us comes the responsibility to act to address the fraud and corruption that “are incompatible with the requirements of justice.”(2) Corruption is not a party issue, it is a human issue, an issue of original sin. I believe many of us want to act but we don’t really know what to do. From this day, I pledge to make this blog a place that points out actions we can take. Often, they will be things I myself am doing. We all know I’m sick so if I can do it, then practically anyone else can too. Fallen Sparrow is also working on this project with me (3) and in fact suggested the first act.

And he fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterward he was hungry. (Matthew 4:2)

Let’s begin with a 40 Day Fast For Freedom. Let’s become hungry too. Hungry to do the jobs God has given us, to do the work for freedom. It’s quite simple: the United Nations Climate Change Conference begins on December 7. On October 30th, we begin 40 days of fasting, sacrifice and prayer for freedom. Our fast will culminate on December 8th, which Catholics and some other Christians celebrate as the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. We might pray the Rosary, or the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, or the Lord's Prayer, pray extemporaneously, or just set aside a period of five or ten minutes each day to pray the Psalms: Psalm 127 comes to mind first. But also Psalms 23, 51, 54, 55 and 138 through 143 come to mind as particularly appropriate. People might come together in groups to pray (and groups are a powerful way to battle fear).

Fasting and sacrifice can be just as simple. For those same 40 days, give up a an hour of TV to read Scripture. Spend time writing or calling your Congressman and Senators (4) instead of going shopping. Give up a favourite food or beverage. Choose something simple to do or give up for the next 40 days. Follow our Lord into the desert so that we might each be prepared to do the job of preserving the freedom He has given us. Copy the people of Nineveh whom our Lord praised.(5) Let’s join together as a nation in prayer, sacrifice and fasting humbly begging God to grant us what we need to reclaim and preserve our freedom.

Let us make a special offering of ourselves, through prayer and sacrifice, on November 3rd, election day. Several important elections are taking place that day throughout the country: governor's races in Virginia and New Jersey, a special Congressional election in New York State, a gay marriage ballot question in Maine, and countless local and municipal elections nationwide. Pray that God's will and a spirit of freedom guide the electorate in those races.

We have been promised freedom. The freedom to worship God in holiness and righteousness. That’s why the pilgrims came to these shores, for the freedom to worship God in holiness and righteousness. That’s why we have the first amendment to the Constitution, that we might be free to worship God in holiness and righteousness. And we know, if we think about it for the merest second, most of the world does not have such freedom. Most of the world is constrained to worship God as their states dictate. Why would we trust those who do not even allow their own citizens the freedom to worship God in holiness and righteousness with imposing a world government on us? How foolish we would be to trade the freedom God has given us for the tyranny of the United Nations.

"Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,
for he has visited and redeemed his people,
and has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David,
as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old,
that we should be saved from our enemies,
and from the hand of all who hate us;
to perform the mercy promised to our fathers,
and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath which he swore to our father Abraham,
to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies,
might serve him without fear,
in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life.
And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,
to give knowledge of salvation to his people
in the forgiveness of their sins,
through the tender mercy of our God,
when the day shall dawn upon us from on high
to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace." (Luke 1:68-79)

(1) The Catechism of the Catholic Church
(2) Please make further suggestions for prayers in the comments box.
(3) Others, who would like to participate, please email me @ allisurdatgmaildotcom (replace the usual)
(4) You can find your representatives at: http://www.govtrack.us/
(5) Matthew 12:41

I figured out how to connect to Twitter!

2009-10-23T11:41:00.000-04:00

Now, if I send any exciting tweets, they'll appear in the little window. Of course, my mundane tweets will appear there too but you'll just ignore those - right?

Refreshing Biblical Times

2009-10-23T11:23:00.000-04:00

Every few years, I read the entire Bible as if it is one book. Beginning with Genesis, I continue on through Revelations. It is a practice I began when I was just five, before anyone taught me that I was supposed to understand what I read before I read it. Perhaps that first experience of reading something that I couldn't understand very well prepared me to ignore my teachers much of the time, which is what I usually did at least until I became a wise teenager. They didn't make much sense and most of them didn't seem to konw God (my litmus test for wisdom). I tried to take the knowledge they could impart and use it to go my own way - I wasn't an easy child.

I strongly reccomend reading the Bible in this fashion as well as studying particular books, reading the lessons in the Divine office, reading and rereading particular, perhaps favourite passages - as well as reading Scripture any way you normally would. One finds the Bible is exciting, more exciting than any novel. It's a history of God's relationship with His people. The Bible shows us so much about them and how they are just like us. It is filled with human beings who are as wicked as we are, as good as we are, significantly better than we are - we can see that we are God's people; He has chosen to continue the story in our lives. The Bible belongs to us and we would be wise to listen to what God is telling us through it.

I am a very fast reader and usually make it through the entire Bible in a month to six weeks. Because my illness affects memory, concentration and other cognitive functions, it will probably take me two years or more this time - I began sometime last year and am only now at Isaiah. That seems to be a blessing because my limited focus is on one chapter or less at each reading and new things jump out at me, old favourites reveal new depths. Isaiah is one of my all time favourite books. A portion of the chapter I read this morning seems quite timely so here it is. Read and be refreshed. May God bless all those who come here.

[12] "I, I am he that comforts you;
who are you that you are afraid of man who dies,
of the son of man who is made like grass,
[13] and have forgotten the LORD, your Maker,
who stretched out the heavens
and laid the foundations of the earth,
and fear continually all the day
because of the fury of the oppressor,
when he sets himself to destroy?
And where is the fury of the oppressor?
[14] He who is bowed down shall speedily be released;
he shall not die and go down to the Pit,
neither shall his bread fail.
[15] For I am the LORD your God,
who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar --
the LORD of hosts is his name.
[16] And I have put my words in your mouth,
and hid you in the shadow of my hand,
stretching out the heavens
and laying the foundations of the earth,
and saying to Zion, `You are my people.'"
[17] Rouse yourself, rouse yourself,
stand up, O Jerusalem,
you who have drunk at the hand of the LORD
the cup of his wrath,
who have drunk to the dregs
the bowl of staggering.
[18] There is none to guide her
among all the sons she has borne;
there is none to take her by the hand
among all the sons she has brought up.
[19] These two things have befallen you --
who will condole with you? --
devastation and destruction, famine and sword;
who will comfort you?
[20] Your sons have fainted,
they lie at the head of every street
like an antelope in a net;
they are full of the wrath of the LORD,
the rebuke of your God.
[21] Therefore hear this, you who are afflicted,
who are drunk, but not with wine:
[22] Thus says your Lord, the LORD,
your God who pleads the cause of his people:
"Behold, I have taken from your hand the cup of staggering;
the bowl of my wrath
you shall drink no more;
[23] and I will put it into the hand of your tormentors,
who have said to you,
`Bow down, that we may pass over';
and you have made your back like the ground
and like the street for them to pass over." (Isaiah 51:12-23)

It's A Faith Issue

2009-10-23T00:25:00.000-04:00

We average, ordinary Americans have been given a priceless gift, American citizenship. As part of that priceless gift, we average, ordinary American ciizens have been given the responsibility to govern ourselves. As a child in grammar school, I was taught that this country is a democracy. That is not true. We do have a democratic form of government but actually, we are citizens of a republic.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a republic as a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law. The supreme power rests with us. We elect our representatives and they are responsible to us which is rather difficult to take in: we've been taught to obey the state. But it turns out, we are the state. So whom do we obey? Well we haven't been left to do exactly as we please. Our republic is a nation of laws and most particulary, we live within the boundaries of the Constitution of the United States. The Constitution is another priceless gift.

To be good Christians, we must accept the gifts God has given us. And the responsibilities that go along with them. If we don't, we fail to accept God's gifts; if we will not rule ourselves, we will be ruled by men such as this one*:

Let us remember that God does not give gifts because we are worthy of them but rather because He loves us, rather for the glory of His name, so as to make us able to "declare [His] glory among the nations." We haven't been doing so well at that one either but I honestly believe if we will govern ourselves as our founding fathers conceived, we will begin to declare His glory.

As far as possible citizens should take an active part in public life. The manner of this participation may vary from one country or culture to another. "One must pay tribute to those nations whose systems permit the largest possible number of the citizens to take part in public life in a climate of genuine freedom."**

* Video of Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton
** The Catechism of the Catholic Church, Para. 1

more later

FCC Vote on Internet Freedom

2009-10-21T22:31:00.000-04:00

I can't say it better (and I'm too tired to try):

Tomorrow, the FCC votes on "what it calls a "Notice of Proposed Rulemaking" (NPRM) on Net Neutrality. In the event the NPRM passes, it will trigger a comment period in which the public will be allowed to file opinions.

"The Internet has become a powerful communications and economic force because it has been free from government interference. To make sure the power and promise of the Internet continues, we need to keep it free of government interference.

We oppose three basic threats to Internet Freedom:

- Taxes
- Regulations
- and any attempt by the United Nations to manage the Internet"

This concerns every one of us who uses the Internet. Please read this, sign the petition and follow the link (and try) to comment on the FCC's website. (I've tried all week and can never get through.) Thanks and God bless.

Why Wait for Copenhagen When You Can Do It At the G20

2009-10-18T18:14:00.000-04:00

Praying and fasting and suffering don't let us off informing ourselves and exercizing our responsibilities as citizens of the United States. So watch this video and really take in what he is saying - at the G20 conference, Obama ceded the sovreignity over our economy to the IMF. If you don't understand the terminology, do the research, ask questions, invest some of your frittering away time on becoming an awake and aware citizen and on learning what all this means to us as Americans and as Catholics.

We Can't Let Them Pull A Fast One

2009-10-17T16:21:00.000-04:00

Fallen Sparrow brought this post to my attention. It's worth reading the entire piece but here are some of the relevant excerpts:

At [the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in] Copenhagen, this December, weeks away, a treaty will be signed. Your president will sign it. Most of the third world countries will sign it, because they think they’re going to get money out of it. Most of the left-wing regime from the European Union will rubber stamp it. Virtually nobody won’t sign it.

I read that treaty. And what it says is this, that a world government is going to be created. The word “government” actually appears as the first of three purposes of the new entity. The second purpose is the transfer of wealth from the countries of the West to third world countries, in satisfication of what is called, coyly, “climate debt” – because we’ve been burning CO2 and they haven’t. We’ve been screwing up the climate and they haven’t. And the third purpose of this new entity, this government, is enforcement.

How many of you think that the word “election” or “democracy” or “vote” or “ballot” occurs anywhere in the 200 pages of that treaty? Quite right, it doesn’t appear once. So, at last, the communists who piled out of the Berlin Wall and into the environmental movement, who took over Greenpeace so that my friends who funded it left within a year, because [the communists] captured it – Now the apotheosis as at hand. They are about to impose a communist world government on the world. You have a president who has very strong sympathies with that point of view. He’s going to sign it. He’ll sign anything. He’s a Nobel Peace Prize [winner]; of course he’ll sign it.

[laughter]

And the trouble is this; if that treaty is signed, if your Constitution says that it takes precedence over your Constitution (sic), and you can’t resign from that treaty unless you get agreement from all the other state parties – And because you’ll be the biggest paying country, they’re not going to let you out of it.

So, thank you, America. You were the beacon of freedom to the world. It is a privilege merely to stand on this soil of freedom while it is still free. But, in the next few weeks, unless you stop it, your president will sign your freedom, your democracy, and your humanity away forever. And neither you nor any subsequent government you may elect will have any power whatsoever to take it back. That is how serious it is. I’ve read the treaty. I’ve seen this stuff about [world] government and climate debt and enforcement. They are going to do this to you whether you like it or not.

But I think it is here, here in your great nation, which I so love and I so admire – it is here that perhaps, at this eleventh hour, at the fifty-ninth minute and fifty-ninth second, you will rise up and you will stop your president from signing that dreadful treaty, that purposeless treaty. For there is no problem with climate and, even if there were, an economic treaty does nothing to [help] it.

So I end by saying to you the words that Winston Churchill addressed to your president in the darkest hour before the dawn of freedom in the Second World War. He quoted from your great poet Longfellow:

Sail on, O Ship of State!
Sail on, O Union, strong and great!
Humanity with all its fears,
With all the hopes of future years,
Is hanging breathless on thy fate!

Also:

Lord Monckton received a standing ovation and took a series of questions from members of the audience. Among those questions were these relevent to the forthcoming Copenhagen treaty:

Question: The current administration and the Democratic majority in Congress has shown little regard for the will of the people. They’re trying to pass a serious government agenda, and serious taxation and burdens on future generations. And there seems to be little to stop them. How do you propose we stop Obama from doing this, because I see no way to stop him from signing anything in Copenhagen. I believe that’s his agenda and he’ll do it.

I don’t minimize the difficulty. But on this subject – I don’t really do politics, because it’s not right. In the end, your politics is for you. The correct procedure is for you to get onto your representatives, both in the US Senate where the bill has yet to go through (you can try and stop that) and in [the House], and get them to demand their right of audience (which they all have) with the president and tell him about this treaty. There are many very powerful people in this room, wealthy people, influential people. Get onto the media, tell them about this treaty. If they go to www.wattsupwiththat.com, they will find (if they look carefully enough) a copy of that treaty, because I arranged for it to be posted there not so long ago. Let them read it, and let the press tell the people that their democracy is about to be taken away for no good purpose, at least [with] no scientific basis [in reference to climate change]. Tell the press to say this. Tell the press to say that, even if there is a problem [with climate change], you don’t want your democracy taken away. It really is as simple as that.

Do read the entire treaty. Here is a most relevant excerpt (I've left in their editorializing and emphasis since they're helpful):

38. The scheme for the new institutional arrangement under the Convention will be based on three basic pillars: government; facilitative mechanism; and financial mechanism, and the basic organization of which will include the following:

World Government (heading added)
a) The government will be ruled by the COP with the support of a new subsidiary body on adaptation, and of an Executive Board responsible for the management of the new funds and the related facilitative processes and bodies. The current Convention secretariat will operate as such, as appropriate.

To Redistribute Wealth (heading added)
b) The Convention’s financial mechanism will include a multilateral climate change fund including five windows: (a) an Adaptation window, (b) a Compensation window, to address loss and damage from climate change impacts [read: the "climate debt" Monckton refers to], including insurance, rehabilitation and compensatory components, (c) Technology window; (d) a Mitigation window; and (e) a REDD window, to support a multi-phases process for positive forest incentives relating to REDD actions.

With Enforcement Authority (heading added)
c) The Convention’s facilitative mechanism will include: (a) work programmes for adaptation and mitigation; (b) a long-term REDD process; (c) a short-term technology action plan; (d) an expert group on adaptation established by the subsidiary body on adaptation, and expert groups on mitigation, technologies and on monitoring, reporting and verification; and (e) an international registry for the monitoring, reporting and verification of compliance of emission reduction commitments, and the transfer of technical and financial resources from developed countries to developing countries. The secretariat will provide technical and administrative support, including a new centre for information exchange [read; enforcement].

We must do everything we can, more than we think we can to certain that this is not signed. We can and will cast off the evil and mischief that is being perpetrated by both parties in this country. And we must become vigilant so that it doesn't seep in again. But the evil that can be unleashed by a treaty that would deprive us of our sovreignity is unthinkable. This is truly scary stuff (and I don't scare easily). If you agree, start making a lot of noise. I've emailed and tweeted everyone I can think of. Please do the same. And don't stop. Make this the topic of conversation for as long as necessary. Let's make it clear that we refuse to become a party to any treaty on climate change without the full consent of the actual people of the United States of America.

We are not serfs. Our elected officials do not reign over us and take care of us since we're unable to care for ourselves. Neither are we blind. And we must not be silent. This climate change garbage has gone far enough. Let's pray, yes! And let's also use every talent God has given us, even if it's just a soft whisper, to do something about it!

Sometimes There's Only the Job

2009-10-11T21:18:00.000-04:00

Today I found a new blog, Autographed Letter Signed. The piece, Sunday Soliloquy: Chicken Soup For The Motherless Daughter’s Soul, is so heartbreakingly lovely, it made me realize that I must write one of the posts that has been ruminating in my mind these past days.

There is so much I want to do. There are so many ways I want to participate in the great drama that God continues to unfold in our nation and our world. The time I spend in bed irritates me. Doing laundry on one day should not knock me out the next and the next. I should be able to go to a friend's birthday party and then get up and do something, anything, the next day. I want to be stronger than I am and I really haven't understood why I am so overwhelmingly fatigued. Then last Monday my doctor (who is really a wonderful doctor and among my favourite people) took a look at my bloodwork and said, "Hmm. Your kidneys are only functioning at 60%."

I am rather stupid about these things particularly since I decided to stop searching the internet for every word on every report. I have no way to put all that information in context and reading Lancet* is really no help. So he explained to me that kidneys are supposed to function at 90% or better and 60% wasn't good. He did tell me that they wouldn't think of rushing me to hospital until functioning was down to 20% but I was a bit preoccupied with that 60%. He instructed me to tell my rheumatologist that I have kidney disease associated with autoimmune disease.

I don't know if the disease can be treated, if functioning can be restored. (Well it can - but you know what I mean.) And of course, the internet is still no help. This kind of kidney problem is the most difficult to treat but who, besides a doctor, knows what that means. My rheumatologist will have all the information this week and hopefully, she will have more answers.

But I do understand why I am so much weaker, so overwhelmingly fatigued. Right now, my primary job is to be ill and so I shall do the best job I can. And when I can type out a few coherent paragraphs or twitter 140 characters that make sense, I shall.

To do the job, that's enough. I needn't define it - I can't define it. But when it presents itself, when it stares you in the face, when you know this is the job I must do, the only thing is to do it. And to be grateful that God trusts us so much. And maybe He'll have a different job for me next month.

*I think I have previously intimated my nerdiness. I understand a subscription to Lancet is absolute proof.

** Two friends have already offered me kidneys which is just so absolutely lovely but let's still hope I don't need them.

Important Thing To Do With Frittering Away Money

2009-10-07T14:36:00.001-04:00

This is important. Money that we might fritter away on stuff we don't even recall buying would be well spent on helping Belmont Abbey College. And, the repercussions could be great - we could help stop such attacks or at least slow them down; we could help limit the evil that would just love to take over every life in this country. God bless.

from: Rick Santorum
ricksantorum@becketfund.org

Re: Defending Belmont Abbey College

The Obama Administration is working to erase respect for conscience from health insurance and the law in general…

… Don’t believe me?

In his address at the University of Notre Dame, Obama talked a good game about respecting conscience on abortion rights. He did the same thing when he met the Pope. But that was all it was -- talk.

The Obama Administration’s attack on Belmont Abbey College proves that.

Belmont Abbey College is a small, private, Catholic college located in North Carolina. For 130 years, it and the Benedictine monks who run it have been dedicated to handing on the Catholic faith.

But the Obama Administration is now trying to force them to abandon that faith or go out of business.

You see, the Administration at Belmont Abbey College removed contraception, abortion, and voluntary sterilization from its faculty's health care policy after discovering it had accidentally been a part of existing plans.

Employees of the school who objected to this change in policy brought a complaint against the school accusing them of “gender discrimination.”

This accusation against Belmont Abbey College couldn’t be further from the truth.

Belmont Abbey College was not discriminating against women. Unlike many “believers in name only” the college was adhering to the principles of its faith.

At first, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) found no evidence of gender discrimination by Belmont Abbey College…..

After a few weeks, the EEOC mysteriously reversed course and announced, in effect, that the college had better toe the Administration’s line, or else.

They are now demanding the school go against the very principles it exists to serve.

Don’t be fooled.

Killing or funding the killing of unborn children has nothing to do with promoting human health. And including these atrocities in every “health care” plan -- no matter how shrewdly hidden or diplomatically stated – violates the consciences of Catholics everywhere.
No Catholic college or other religious institution should ever be required by the government to violate its moral beliefs ...

... Which is why I’m asking for your help today.

Your immediate support for the defense of Belmont Abbey College is VITAL, not only for Belmont Abbey, but for all religious institutions in America.

Too many were silent when Obama went to Notre Dame. As a result his Administration has been emboldened to attack all Catholic institutions. Now, they are shamelessly picking on a small Catholic college – Belmont Abbey.

Tomorrow it could be your local church, the parochial school you send your kids to, it could be the Jesus bumper sticker on your car…

If Obama is given the opportunity to attack even the oldest and most respected religious establishments across the country, what will be next?

The President of Belmont Abbey College has bravely stated that he would rather close the school than go against the church’s most fundamental teachings ...

I commend him for his moral conviction, but I’m afraid for the future of religious freedom in our country.

… Think I’m overreacting?

The impact of even one Catholic college knuckling under or closing would be a catastrophe for all religious institutions.

Which is why I am asking for your help.

Will you stand with me against the Obama Administration’s war on conscience?

Luckily, the Belmont Abbey College has enlisted the help of a law firm that specializes in defending against this type of travesty. It’s called the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.

The Becket Fund has a solid reputation for being the best in the business.

I know first hand how effective the Becket Fund is in preserving our freedom of religion. I’ve known them for years.

Way back in the Clinton Administration when Clinton threatened to court-martial military chaplains who followed their consciences by preaching against Clinton’s veto of the Partial Birth Abortion Ban, it was the Becket Fund that filed suit in federal court and got that gag order struck down.

And just this past week, when the Freedom from Religion Foundation sued to strike “under God” from the Pledge of Allegiance, it was the Becket Fund that intervened in the case and successfully defended the Pledge.

In between they have successfully defended all sorts of believers and religious institutions.

Archbishop Chaput knows them well too. As he likes to say, “The work of The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty is more than ‘good.’ It’s vital.”

By contributing to the Becket Fund, you can directly support religious freedom — for Belmont Abbey — and every other religious school or institution in the country.

Make no mistake, this will not be easy. The Obama Administration is relentless about silencing religious believers.

Will you do me a personal favor, in the name of religious freedom, and contribute – today -- to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty’s fight for Belmont Abbey College and for all other religious institutions?

Time is of the essence. Belmont Abbey College stands for the moral teachings and principles of the Catholic Church -- it stands for life.

... You and I simply cannot allow the radical leftists in this country to succeed in demanding Belmont Abbey College turn its back on the most basic and fundamental teachings of the church or else close.

Belmont Abbey President William Thierfelder recently said, "All of us need to have moral courage in today's world." He added. "We are so resolute in our commitment to the teachings of the Catholic Church that there is no possible way we would ever deviate from it, and if it came down to it ... we would close the school rather than give in ...”

.... Will you exercise your moral courage and help me defend Belmont Abbey College with an urgent and immediate contribution of $500, $250, $100, $35, or whatever you can afford, to prevent religious freedom from becoming a thing of the past?

I’m counting on you to act TODAY!

God Bless,

Hon. Rick Santorum
United State Senator 1995-2007

P.S. I’m tired of hearing outsiders and insiders tell Catholics and other devout religious believers to keep quiet about our religious and moral views in society. That's a kind of bullying. And I don't think Catholics or persons of any faith should accept it.... For the sake and the right of religious liberty for all, I urge you to contribute to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, and support the Belmont Abbey College, TODAY!

They're Giving Me Powerful Drugs

2009-09-30T19:04:00.042-04:00

I have been sick. Was taking Ambien and then began eating and then cooking in my sleep which is most distressing. I have no memory of eating ice cream, and candy and mac & cheese - it was great mac & cheese at the restaurant and since I added more cheese*, I bet it was even better. And I gained weight! If I'm going to make myself fat, I want to enjoy it!

Now, we're switching to Restoril. I use "we" because my doctor muttered her way through several possibilities until she decided Restoril was the best choice. Actually, I'm trying Restoril. I've stopped eating in my sleep and haven't found any unexpected dirty dishes in the sink the next day. And I sleep. But, for the past week, I've been waking at 7.30 to take my a.m. meds, then I try to read morning prayer and a bit of Isaiah and a bit of something else but the next thing I know, it's 12.30/1. Except for days like today when I slept through my alarm and woke for the first time at 1. (I went to a party last night. It was quiet. Just a friend's birthday. And I was home by 11. But that must be past my sell-by hour. Que sera.)

Restoril keeps me out of it most of the time. Before, my friends thought I was always slightly drunk. Now, they think I'm significantly more slightly drunk. Yet maybe it's not the Restoril. I've had a lot of wooziness since having the chemo and have spent 3 of 7 days in bed since July when I had to take a break from work. Maybe the wooziness is just increasing and I will be woozier and woozier as time goes on. Has potential to be great fun. Imagine the things one could sleep through. And wooziness might be a defense for all sorts of accidents, like leaving Bergdorf's wearing amazing shoes.

I do have lots of stuff on my mind and a new photo of myself, if my friend ever sends it to me, looking like a deer caught in an SUV's headlights which I might post, if my friend ever sends it to me. So I'll keep posting whenever I can. (It's sort of an adventure.) And if you know anything about Restoril, please advise. This stuff is powerful. (Maybe my body will become accustomed to it and I will sleep less and less. I'm already taking the lowest dose so maybe that will happen soon.)

Meanwhile, here's one of my favourite Onion clips:

* more cheese always makes mac & cheese better

They Work For Us

2009-09-24T14:52:00.000-04:00

Where are the leaders we need right now?

In my previous post, I erred in asking, where are the leaders particularly since I was actually asking, Where are those who will take over the job of leading this country so I can get back to my life? Like most Americans, I am still learning to be an American. An education in this country has provided me with much misinformation. I am now re-educating myself so that I am an informed and fully participating citizen. Assisting me are friends such as Fallen Sparrow who pointed out that in the United States of America, we don’t have leaders, we have representatives. The preamble of the Constitution begins: We the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect union... We the people are sovereign. We the people are the leaders. Those we elect represent us. They are our servants.

Most Catholics (and I think most people) seem uncomfortable with servants. As Christians, we are taught to be servants. As Americans, we've been taught that we live in a democracy*, that "all men [and women] are created equal", that here, there are no servants (and therefore no masters). The very idea of having servants conjures up images of Cinderella, “let them eat cake,” and a level of wealth that translates into Scrooge's treatment of poor Bob Cratchit or the monstrous Simon Legree**. I get the impression that most Americans believe it’s immoral to expect someone else to be their servant. But in reality we have all sorts of servants. They collect our garbage, chlorinate our water, sweep our streets. But we don't usually feel that those who do such jobs are servants. We think we have become egalitarian. Actually, we have only learned to lie to ourselves better. We pretend that servants don’t exist and so pretend we have no role in regards to them.

Most of us think our primary job as citizens is voting, Many Catholics know we must also be informed so that we choose candidates who adhere to Church teaching or at least, natural law. Some of us vote to limit evil and/or for those who espouse sound economic and foreign policies. On the whole though, we vote and then believe we should be left alone to live our lives while those we elect get on with the business of running the country. But public servants merely represent us. They speak with our voices, carry out our decisions within the confines we set. They cannot and must not make decisions for us. Since we are sovereign, an integral part of living our own lives is running our country.

That is a great difficulty for many Catholics, for many Christians. The Church teaches us that we are to obey the state. That’s not a unique teaching of the Magisterium, scripture teaches the same. But in America, we the people are the state. In America, we the people must govern our own lives. In America we must set standards for ourselves and must teach those standards to our children. We must be the masters of this country, must be good stewards of the unique gift we have received.

I often encounter Catholics who tell me, when they find a candidate who adheres to Church teaching, they will vote for him/her. We have the expectation that others will present us with the right platform. But we forget, it is our job to set the standards, to tell our potential servants what they should be doing. In at least a general sense, we need to create the platforms, the policies and the positions that potential servants will flesh out and fulfill. To do so, we must be well educated and well informed. We must be involved in our communities: unmarried people must participate in decisions that involve children, married people must participate in decisions that involve those who are not married. And not only because those issues involve taxes but because the decisions made for others in our country affect all of us. We must encourage those in our community who can serve to run for public office. We must remain aware of what our servants are doing, of whether they are performing their duties responsibly. We must make certain they have what they need to do their jobs and pay them fair wages.

To ensure that our home is well cared for. Before we ask whether a particular candidate can do the job, we must know what that job entails. We must know the standards for those jobs and make certain candidates have shown evidence that they will live up to them. We must approach elections as if we are reluctantly hiring someone to care for our fragile, infant children; we must not be frivolous in choosing public servants. And, as those of us who have hired staff know, when our servants don't do their jobs we must replace them. We must realize, here, to be a good Catholic, to be a good Christian, we must do the work of governing, we must be faithful masters – that this is an integral part of stewardship.

Our Constitution sets forth the laws by which America exists. All other laws must be in accordance with it. It is not scripture but it is a certain guide within which we, the individual citizens, are able to govern her. Within it, we are the masters. This is the grace God has bestowed upon us through American citizenship. The grace and also the job, because as masters, it is our responsibility to keep our eyes on our servants. If we are not diligent, the servants will take control of our home and they will behave no better than the servants in the parables Jesus told.

* Again, Fallen Sparrow reminds me that the United States is a Republic not a democracy.

** I highly reccommend Harriet Beecher Stowe's, Uncle Tom's Cabin. It is an amazing book that was instrumental in abolishing slavery and is most useful for self re-education. I wonder if modern works such as this one might help change hearts in re abortion.

Twitter Feed...

2009-09-23T11:01:00.000-04:00

...I've added one. I have no idea what I'll do with it but here it is and we'll see what happens.

Reworking of My September 18th Post

2009-09-19T15:54:00.001-04:00

It seems my post yesterday was as woozy as I was, maybe it's not so bad that I am usually far away from my computer during my more lucid periods. Today, I'm still woozy but I've had input from a few friends so hopefully I won't degenerate into meaninglessness.

America, for many non-Americans, has always been the safe place, the haven. This is the place the poor and oppressed and desperate could come to be safe from destructive governements and economic systems. Many have found asylum here. This is where my parents sent me. And this has been a safe place even though very bad things can and do happen here. There is child abuse and exploitation and crime and all sorts of sin and misfortune. But this is also a place where one can build a life oneself.

Not too long ago, one of my roommates was a young Frenchman who was studying banking. In grammar school, he had been identified to study maths and though his interest was literature, he had been shuffled along the maths route until here he was at Columbia, fees and expenses paid, following an approved maths career. (He plans to make an enormous amount of money in banking and retire in ten or fifteen years.) That doesn't happen here. We choose our own directions, can and often do change course if we desire. In America, we build our own lives and that is a precious gift. If we fail we can try again if we are willing to do so. Our individual wills are the most important possession any of has in this country, the determinant of whether or not we will build lives for ourselves.

Most of us do. And many from other countries have come here and built lives for themselves. I think much of the envy directed at the US is because anyone with some talent, imagination, spunk and the willingness to work hard can create a place for himself here. That place might not be grand. It might not be expensive. It might not look the way magazines say it should. It might not even consist in things but rather in merely the freedom to be free - to be "king of the road." But it belongs to oneself.

Here we can build lives that are neither dependent on nor beholden to the state. Here community and society are freely chosen not imposed. Here, the family, the church or other religious institution, and our neighbourhoods are supposed to provide the moral development we need to care for ourselves, create new families and be good citizens. Here we are trusted to care for ourselves. To care for our families. To govern ourselves and our families.

We are at a time when many believe we can't care for ourselves. Actually, it seems many believe we ought to care for those who don't care for themselves. I am (or trying very hard to be) a faithful Catholic. I believe we have a moral imperative to care for those who can't care for themselves. But I don't believe the government is the best way to do that and I also don't think the Church teaches that caring for the poor must be the work of the government - particularly when the government has shown it can't do the job. I also believe we have a moral imperative to help those who could use a hand up or a shoulder to lean on. But I absolutely don't believe in taking care of those who will not work or those who do work and yet feel entitled to be cared for while they follow their dreams.

Right now, health insurance is the hot issue. There is a cacaphony about it these days. But there is also noise about welfare and "cash for clunkers" and stimulus money, and various community activist groups and so many other issues. We are in a time of noise and more noise. A time of being intentionally told that all is in disorder. 85% of Americans are satisfied with their health insurance yet there is a health insurance crisis. Well we're not stupid. We know there's no crisis. All it is is noise that distracts us from remembering what it means to be Americans. Distracts us from living our own lives. At the same time, there seems to be a paucity of leaders reminding us of what it means to be Americans too. Reminding us of the good that we have here in this country.

Instead, we've got leaders who create noise and unrest and calumny. They shovel issue after issue upon us and insist, "We must pass legislation now!" All this activity just distracts us, is aimed aat filling us up with chaos so that we aren't focusing on living our own lives, on taking care of ourselves. All this noise puts us in a defensive stance ready to fend off the next blast, caught up in the chaos. Some have hailed at least one of those leaders as a messiah. My first question is, Does the real Messiah bring noise and unrest and calumny and distraction? Does He bring chaos?

And my second question: Where are the leaders we need right now? The ones who will remind us that this is America? The ones who will remind us of the ways we have addressed issues in the past? And we have addressed many issues - independence, slavery, the dust bowl, going to the moon, segregation, child labour. We've addressed issues that seemed utterly intractable. Where are the leaders who will remind us of that?

I don't want leaders who will solve everything for me. I want leaders I can trust, leaders who know what it is to be an American, leaders who will encourage the citizens of this country to find answers to the needs of our time. I want leaders who will trust us, the American people. Though we can and will get things wrong sometimes, we've proven trustworthy in the past. We are trustworthy now but we need leaders who will provide calm direction in the midst of this chaos.

Excuse Me, Isn't This America?

2009-09-18T15:24:00.001-04:00

Seems I was woozier yesterday than I realized. Stay tuned...

Today is one of my very woozy, in pain, totally out of it days. Much of the time these days, random thoughts about what I've heard or read run through my mind. Conversation with friends who know that I'm usually talking about several subjects at the same time are most helpful in separating the strands and tying the related ones together. And sometimes clear thoughts just come to mind. Usually I forget them until someone reminds me - but then I am away from my computer. Today, they just happened to come while I was showering and I have enough time to write them down before leaving for my physical therapy appointment. You see I, like so many Americans, am concerned, troubled even. There is so much about this healthcare debate that makes no sense to me: why aren't we remembering that this is America?

Isn't this the oountry where entreprenurial doctors have developed Urgent Care Centers to provide for the sick who don't need the emergency room but do need medical attention? Isn't this the country that creates not-for-profits to enroll the poor in Medicaid? Isn't this the country where brilliant folks, ordinary Joes, entrepreneurs and just plain anyone with a good idea and the willingness to put in some hard work can come up with answers to problems? And isn't it true that those of us who don't have the talent to find answers can work for or invest in the ideas of others? Isn't that what we have done in the past? Why do so many of us insist that health care is a zero-sum game?

Why are we listening to anyone compare the US to Canada or any other nation? When did we stop being the gold standard? When did we stop being the country to which immigrants (legal and illegal) flock and long to flock so that they can build a life for themselves? Maybe even develop one of their own good ideas? Isn't the opportunity for people to build a life for themselves and their families one of the greatest strengths this country has? Isn't that all we want? Not someone to do the work for us but just the opportunity to take care of ourselves? (This "you need the government to fix things for you" attitude is just fucking insulting!)

~~I really don't get it. The incessant clammouring makes no sense. Is that what a messiah brings? Noise and more noise? Distraction after distraction? NFW! And we know that.~~

It seems to me that we desperately need leaders who remember what America means. Leaders who are not out to control (another part of being American is being the people who refuse to be controlled), but out to do the job of leading us. Right now, we need leaders who tell us the truth even when we don't like it. We need leaders who point out consequences and trust us to be responsible. Leaders who know we're not stupid but that we could use some direction sometimes and need someone doing the things we can't do - like defense and certain aspects of trade - those things outlined in the Constitution. I don't care if they're Republican or Conservative or something else. I only care that they remember who we are and that they be trustworthy.

~~PS - I can't find the spell check button and I'm too tired to look for it anymore so please forgive me any mispelled words and other mistakes too. Thanks.~~

More Riffing On a Theme

2009-09-17T22:16:00.000-04:00

I am about five. Actually, I'm an adult woman and sometimes I even present myself as a sophisticated, refined, beautiful one. But most days there's not a great deal of difference between five-year old me and five-plus times five-year old me. I have a drawer filled with baseball caps. Another is filled with neat little t-shirts. I wear comfy pants or full skirts so I can tuck my feet up or sit sprawled out. Most of my shoes are flats. Many of them are beautiful but could as easily be a child's dress shoes as an adult's. Even my hair is little-girl fine and when allowed to air dry forms itself into a mass of little-girl ringlets. Recently, as I waited to meet a friend for lunch, I saw my reflection in a plate glass window and realized all I needed was a lunch box to complete the ensemble. (My friend offered to get me one for my birthday but I declined.)

Watching 50s and 60s classic TV takes me to a time when girls grew into womanhood. Wearing stockings was a rite of passage as was wearing lipstick (lip gloss did not exist). The clothing women in the '50s and '60s wore was not suitable for a little girl not because it was risqué but rather because it was mature and not appropriate for rushing about with flying hair and skinned knees. Something happened to girls so that they were not only interested in boys but also interested in taking their places alongside other adult women; girls wanted to be women like their mothers and dressing like them was an integral part of the something that happened.

I am only now beginning to experience the desire to take my place in the world as a woman. Partly, that includes dressing as a woman because I am one. Whereas I have always loved fashion, I have done so as if I am dressing paper dolls and I am the doll. It's a most interesting place to be: I have put together a wardrobe of beautiful clothes and shoes. I can go to that closet and put together an outfit for nearly any occasion. People often compliment me on what I am wearing. I have worked in fashion, am an expert seamstress and have even designed clothing for myself and others. And frequently, (in fact, as often as I can get away with it) I dress as if I am a child. Donna Reed and June Cleaver always look like women, even wearing old clothing to clean the attic. I often look like a kid even when I'm dressed for a formal occasion.

I would like there to be a difference between the way I present myself today and the way I did when I was five. It seems fitting. I don't know what I will look like - attractive, I hope. And though I love vintage pieces, I don't want to become a costumed throwback to the '50s or '60s. But I do want to grow up; it's time I became a woman.

UPDATE: 17 August 2009 By the way, this is my first embedded picture. It's so exciting (hugging myself with joy). (See, I really am five.)

He Remembered!!!!

2009-09-07T14:15:00.010-04:00

During my detour through the Anglican Communion, I seriously considered entering religious life as an Anglican nun. For reasons I shall not try to explain now, I came to the decision that God was not calling me to that vocation. Several years later, I became friends with Fallen Sparrow who is, in many ways, the brother I didn't have until I grew up enough to believe I didn't need one. I soon decided that if someone like him could be a Catholic then there was hope that I could be one too.

My detour into the land of Anglicans occurred partly due to my own pride and partly due to bad catechises. I had fought my Southern Baptist minister foster-father's denunciation of Catholics, had even kept a child's version of the catechism hidden under my mattress and read it over and over. At 11, I began sneaking out to go to Mass. By 13, a paperback copy of Franz Werfel's, The Song of Bernadette joined my hidden catechism and Bernadette became a dear friend. But while preparing for confirmation in NY at 16, I discovered that sin seemed to have been degraded to bad feelings and attitudes, to misunderstandings; it wasn't really my fault. Pre-marital sex was not a sin as long as both parties were "honest" with each other about being "ready" for sex. So much that I had thought clear was suddenly very confusing. And when I encountered priests who ridiculed and belittled me (even shouted at me) or told me a particular work was "over my head", I began to ask myself, Is this what I worked so hard to hold onto? After university while looking for a new parish, I wandered into St. Thomas' Church on Fifth Avenue and by the time I realized it wasn't Catholic, I was mid-way through the class to prepare for reception into the Anglican Communion.

In the late '80s, I found greater orthodoxy in the Anglican Communion than I did in the Catholic Church and more kindness. Not that I conducted any sort of search for either among Catholics, I thought the Church was the same everywhere. Besides, I wasn't being asked to stop believing anything I already believed. The only real difference was that Anglicans believed that the Pope, as the bishop of Rome, was first among equals rather than the head of the Church. But they deferred to him, there were even classes for reading Papal encyclicals; education is taken seriously in high Anglican parishes. And worship was taken so much more seriously, as it was when I was a young child sitting at Mass between Marmar and Papa.

At first, I was simply awed by the amount of sheer knowledge available to me and I imbibed as much of it as I could. During that time, I began to seriously consider becoming a nun. The All Saints Sisters of the Poor in Catonsville attracted me. I spent time with them and actually began the daunting application process. And though I did not join them, in the short time I knew them, I came to love the All Saints Sisters precisely because of their desire for holiness.

Eventually I realized that learning was making me able to comment knowledgeably about all sorts of churchy things but was not helping me to love God better. I saw that holiness was impossible unless I returned to the Catholic Church, that I just couldn't do it on my own. And though I had been taught by Anglicans and Catholics that the Church is run by old white men who are out of touch with current reality, after many conversations with God and with FS, during which I insisted that I was an Anglican and had no intention of returning to the Catholic Church, I woke one Sunday morning to the proposition, What would happen if I went to Mass? So I went to Mass and nothing happened except that I knew I couldn't go back to the Anglican Communion. And I didn't. But since my return, the conversion of the All Saints Sisters of the Poor has been in my prayers because it has been obvious to me that they are Catholic and Catholics belong at home.*

Yesterday was the fifth anniversary of my return to the Catholic Church. I had forgotten. At brunch, several friends told me that nearly an entire convent of traditional Anglican nuns in Maryland had become Catholic and I knew of whom they must be speaking. And so it is. As a friend told me yesterday, whether I had joined them or not, it was God's intention that I come home. And it was His intention that the All Saints Sisters come home too, and that I receive a lovely, lovely anniversary gift: ten of the All Saints Sisters and their chaplain (the only Anglican confessor I could ever find) - how awesome! Doesn't God give such lovely gifts?

* Now I can look forward to all the others I'm asking Him to convert, like the President and his family. Praying for conversions is so exciting!

Riffing on a Theme

2009-08-25T20:34:00.005-04:00

I've moved my computer to my bed. Having a library/work area is, I've decided, reason enough for a single person to have a wide bed (I wish mine was a queen instead of a full). When I was out ill last year I was stronger than I am now. This year, I spend much more of my time in bed. I'm very fortunate to get through the simple form of Morning Prayer in Magnificat. (Who knew that prayer was such demanding work?) Reading is pretty much limited to first thing in the morning. If I don't get it in then, it doesn't happen. And even at that hour, I only get through a few paragraphs which I don't remember.

Forcing my brain to focus has become exhausting. And when I demand too much of myself, I crash - hard. I've just spent the past three days in bed. On Sunday, I could hardly stay awake and missed most of my meals and several doses of meds. Two dear friends were over and I reclined in a big easy chair as my mind wandered in and out of lucidity. Yesterday, another friend stopped me in mid sentence and told me I was rambling. Today, I'm a little more awake, a little more aware, but that means I'm also more aware of pain. I did get out for a walk only to discover that there was not enough air - one hopes the pulmonologist will be able to weigh in with some remedy for that. But then, one has been hoping he would do so for some time now. It would be lovely if there were more air when I exert myself.

My mind wanders a lot these days. Oh I use it as much as possible. I try to keep a Health Journal, work on puzzles and trivia quizzes and take simple surveys. Once in a great while, I participate in a more demanding survey or an IM exchange for a few minutes. (I'm hopeful that I can rebuild my cognitive faculties by using them. And I certainly don't want my brain to atrophy. It may or may not work but it's certainly worth a try.) Mostly though, I watch family comedies from the 50s and 60s and let the thoughts come. Right now, I'm watching Bewitched* and Leave It To Beaver*. And I've made it through Nanny and the Professor (a very sweet program that I highly recommend) and most of Father Knows Best. I've assembled a three page list of family sitcoms from the 50s and 60s (by that I mean sitcoms that focus on the family in some fashion). Those old comedies are gentler than what's available now. Sweeter. I can't even stand being on a noisy bus. Having loud, glaring programs assaulting me through my computer or TV screen is excruciating. Many older sitcoms explored very simple themes through very simple stories. But today, sitcoms are like Times Square in NY - harsh, brash, painful and meaningless. Even the harshest early sitcoms, such as Bewitched, is gentler than those shown today.

And while I'm watching them my mind wanders. The themes they explore are very much the themes I think we need to be exploring today. So many thoughts come to mind. I wish I had more energy to write - these few paragraphs have been stretched throughout the day, whenever I could get a little more done; in the past, this post would have been an hour's work or less. But to the extent possible, I want to write about some of what comes to mind particularly the themes having to do with women and girls. If possible, I'd like to begin a new hobby which I'll write more about later. For now, I just want to suggest that women have been taught to be like Times Square and maybe some of us would like to be something different. Not something that would take us backwards to a golden era that never really existed. But something that will take us forward, bring us closer to God, develop femininity and womanliness. More later...

*Additional episodes available on Netflix.com.

I'm At Home Again

2009-07-27T10:47:00.003-04:00

By the grace of God, I'm home. In bed much of the time (I've slept most of the past two weeks), hoping there is a way to rebuild strength, willing to change my life and accept being disabled if that is what I must do. The chemo has treated many of those things that were killing me but it brings with it overwhelming side affects. The treatment is not worse than the illness but it's at least as debillitating. I can truly say, making it through these past few months has been the hardest thing I've ever done: we truly underestimate ourselves and what God can do with us.

It's hard to imagine what God can do with me right now. He'll work that out. I know that now better than I did a year ago when I was out sick for three and one-half months. What a difference a year of suffering makes.

A few days ago, I dreamt that I had taken a temporary job in God the Father's Office. My supervisor decided that I should spend part of each day working on some special projects with the Father Himself. After lunch I was to go and meet Him. I had a doctor's appointment and told her I might be late. I also mentioned that I would stop and get some jelly beans while I was out. She told me the Father likes the green ones. My appointment ran late but I love jelly beans and hurried to the shop to get them. They had no separate bags of the green kind so I bought only my usual bag of mixed ones. I returned to the office concerned at my tardiness, couldn't find my supervisor so just decidied to ask the angels to point me to the Father's office.

As I approached the innermost sanctum, I became more and more concerned about seeing Him. This was God, the Holiest of Holies and I was too small and too silly and too messed up to see Him. No one else was at all concerned, they just sped me on my way. And when I arrived at the Father's suite of offices, the angel at reception didn't know what I'd be doing but told me I should just go in and see Him; the angel didn't think my opinions about myself had much to do with it. I looked up, and saw the Father's schedule up on the wall and there was my name indicating that I was to spend several hours with Him.

Behind reception was a small hallway with two or three doors. I tried one but it seemed to be a closet. I tried another and there was my supervisor going over schedules with an enormous Person. He was someone I could never have imagined. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry or bow or run away and hide. I thought maybe the Person was a woiman and then, thought, No, maybe He's a man. And then I didn't think anything at all about Him because He asked me a question: Did you bring the green jelly beans?

I was a bit frightened because I didn't have a separate bag for Him but then I found myself saying, I have some green jelly beans at my desk. I'd be happy to get them for You. The Father nodded to me and I returned to my desk and picked all the green jelly beans from my bag of assorted flavours and put them in a bowl for Him.

I think we make things more difficult than they need to be. A year ago, I couldn't stand to be at home alone, couldn't imagine what God might do with me and that drove me crazy. Today, having a shower is exhausting and the question of what God will do with me usually has nothing to do with it - I just need to get dry. These days He seems to want green jelly beans and is patient when I'm late, patient while I pick them out of the bag. And it's good there was no separate bag of the green kind because then God would have only had one flavour. But there are several different flavours of green jelly beans in the bag of mixed ones and I am happy to have the task of picking them out for Him.

PS - I'm hoping to post more often but writing is also exhausting so we'll just see how it goes. I have put my laptop on my bed (reason to have a large bed when you're single - there's space to create a study/TV area) so we'll see.

Silliness

2009-04-13T13:31:00.003-04:00

I've been getting some unsavoury and downright boring comments of the automatic variety - I hope no human being would post such silliness - the models were probably mostly fake too! So, I've enabled both comment moderation and word verification in an attempt to prevent further misuse of my site.

PS - I'm still getting over the infections and extreme fatigue and weakness caused by the chemo. It's a choice of types of crappiness: I'm not sure th way I feel now is better than I did before but this seems less likely to kill me and I hope I'll feel better eventually.

PPS - Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

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A Modern Conversion Story: God is Great!

If That's All There Is

Post from 10 Righteous Men

New Project

The Issue Is Sin (Part 2)

The Issue Is Sin (Part 1)

A New Experiment: What the Church Really Teaches on Socialism

A New Experiment: My Miracle

Sunday Snippets

A Wise Young Woman, an Excellent Site & Ways to Help Keep Children Alive

A New Experiment: Hell Loses Again

Sunday Snippets: Lesser Known Catholic Mystics

A New Experiment: Ezekiel 22

Confession, it's great for the soul!

Sunday Snippets

Thomas Aquinas's Childhood Journal (Excerpts)

A New Experiment: Ez 13 - Will you hunt down souls?

A New Experment: Ezekiel 12

Experiment 8: Stories of Confession

Experiment 7: Hell Doesn’t Own Me

Experiment 6: We Need to Have a "God Bless You" Day!

Experiment 5: Response To An Email

Experiment 3 (actually 4, but I forgot to # the last post): Taking God Up On His Offers

The Old Remedies Are the Best

Experiment #2: The Act of Love

God is good. But what is man?

Omnipotent, Omniscient, Loving & Good - Pt. 1

The Reality God Has Given Us

May Day 2010

Where Did Things Change?

Much Needed Break Day

Catholic Witness & Those Who Bear The Imprint of Hell

He Always Intended To Vote For The Bill

Catholic Witness and the Healthcare Bill

A Nation of Prayer: Something We Can All Do

Dems Tell Us What They Think About The Healthcare Bill

Time To Take Our Heads Out Of The Sand!

I'd Like To Learn To Follow

Great Tidings of Great Joy!

Stretching My Heels

Nothing More Than I Can Imagine

Basic Education In Freedom

Invitation

Seven Wonders of the World (God is so Good)

Dawn Eden Pens a Lovely Piece On Suffering and Joy

The Reason Why I've Become Political

As I've Said Before, I Like This Woman

Via Texas for Sarah Palin - The Greater Reality

My Friend Randy Beeler On The "Real" Church

"I Don't Want Friends"

Please Keep CA & Prop 8 In Your Intentions

I've Removed The Ads

A Particular Gift We Americans Have Been Given

Healthcare "Reform" Is A Very Catholic Issue

It's Time for Sanity

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We're Not the First!

Rattling the Tin Cup

On The 40th Day Evil Reveals Itself

An Important Article

Abby Johnson's Story - Part II

He's Coming!

The Kingdom of Heaven Must Be Among Us

I've Added a Donation Button

40 Days For Freedom: Happy Thanksgiving

The Gates of Hell

Now Thank We All Our God

What Kind of People?

Making A Name for Oneself

40 Days for Freedom: A Post I'd Rather Not Write

Help Draw the Line: No Tax $ for Abortions!

Day Six of 40 Days for Freedom - More Questions

A Query for Day Five of Forty Days for Freedom

More Joy In Heaven Over One Repentant Sinner...

Consider This - Seriously

Day Three of 40 Days for Freedom

Day Two of Forty Days for Freedom

Day One of Forty Days

God Gave Us The Freedom to Laugh Too!