Holidays -- Christmas

Maybe it's just because I'm not showered in gifts anymore, but I've come to really not like Christmas. What's it all about? "Jesus is the reason for the season." A slogan that used to be plastered all over. But what are we celebrating? It's different with Easter. There's a biblical basis, a command to celebrate, and a timeframe for that celebration. First, because it's easiest, the timeframe. We have no real idea about when Jesus was born. Not only are we completely unable to determine what date, or month -- ours or Jewish, or season -- was he born in spring or the dead of winter or fall, but we can't even determine the year with any certainty. Personally, I have to go with Clement on this one, but I'm partial. On all of the celebrations dictated by God, at least to my knowledge, he tells us when. He also tells us to. Celebrate, that is, he tells us to celebrate, and how. And how to celebrate. There's instruction. Not with Christmas, though. It's no more a spiritual celebration than Thanksgiving. And I'm not knocking Thanksgiving. Now biblical basis. Christ was born. That's about it. But even that isn't so remarkable, at least as births go. Great miracle, conception. If you want to celebrate the power and love of God, it's the conception of Christ you're looking for. We also lack command or time for this one, though. Why not his first miracle or teaching in the temple or calming the storm or being recognized as Messiah in the womb by John, also in the womb or ... Even more importantly, on a Christian basis, Christ says that the current era, what we call the age of grace, began with the time of John the Baptist. Forget Christ being born, the big thing is the transition to the age of grace. That's what's important. John beginning his ministry, and ushering us into this age, celebrate that. It's much more religiously important. Then we wouldn't get so caught up in gifts, and extension of Christ's birth brought to us by three? wise men from Orientar, as the song goes. I can't find Orientar on the ancient maps, though. So what's it all about. Family, good will toward others, stressing out over getting just the right present, or not caring whether it's right or not and just getting something -- after all, it's the thought that counts. And this gift says I gave you a cursory thought. My closing thought on Christmas, the gifts the wise men brought after, probably well after, Jesus' birth had a divine purpose. Those gifts financed the families flight from the authorities. Pull that crap now and yule go to prison.

Religion (5), Miracles

"Those with exceptional ability have exceptional responsiblity." It's a tenet taught in some circles of society. The doctrine of those who can must. It is the people with some special talent or skill or opportunity. It may be nothing for them to do, but impossible for others. For those waiting outside the meeting place in the cold rain and wind the locked door presents an impassable obstacle. The janitor comes with the key, opens the door and lets all inside. He's the hero of the hour, but to him he just did what anybody with the key would do. Mundane, simple, unexciting.

People get excited about miracles. They are things we cannot do. Does God get excited. Is he amazed at what he was able to do. What is to us a miracle is just God acting, God doing. Whenever God acts, whenever he does, there is a miracle. I have mostly noticed two distinct human reactions to this. Some people are amazed at what God can do, like they didn't expect it, can't believe it would really happen. I think to them it's new, novel, weird, out of the ordinary. I don't think they see it a lot. There is another group that sees a miracle and takes it in stride. There reaction is something like, "What do you want to do for lunch?" I think this group considers miracles normal activity for God. Normal because they see it. Often. I think that's an indicator that God is in their life as a matter of routine. If you're around God often you see miracles often and it's the way things are. If you're surprised by miracles the, obviously, it's the way things aren't.

Marion Jones

She retired from the sport she loves, enough to cheat, because of her actions. I wonder which actions. Was it using? Was it lying about using? Was it representing herself as good because she's gifted so she could be a role model, and now a huge let down, to young girls the world over? (Why look up to anyone anyway?) Or was it getting caught in her lie? Well that can't be it, that's not really her action.

It reminds me of a little kid who goes through meticulous effort to repeatedly do bad unnoticed but eventually gets caught. That kids apology, and this one, only mean sorry you found out.

Vick and dogfighting

Let's talk boxing. A regulated sport. Two well trained opponents who, presumably, like what they're doing step into a ring and brutalize each other. It's not the old bare knuckle bouts, but people liked watching those, and liked fighting in them.

Dogs that dogfight like it. Dogs that don't like it suck at it. I keep hearing the term "animal abuse" thrown around with this case. I have a hard time really calling it abuse, though. A violent sport, yes. Does the occasional participant die, yes. Same in boxing, the gloved, well regulated kind. I think, and this is an offhand estimate, that about 80% of people throwing down the abuse card are referring to the actual dogfight. So, my estimate, about 80% of people are either kind of dumb or speaking in ignorance or, my personal favorite, both.

There has been a lot of animal abuse associated with dogfighting historically. This was directed at the "training" animals. A good episode or so of "Lou Grant" comes to mind. Good regulation of the sport would eliminate that. Dogfighting would be right there with boxing then. Of course, as long as it's a federal crime it will be hard to put together an authoritative commission to decide on acceptable practices.

So, I suppose, continue crying out about animal abuse. Also continue calling the mess in Darfur a genocide, even I've done that.

Religion (4) God did a good job today!

I've been thinking about what tests our faith, why we abandon the church, and why we abandon God. Some of it has to do with what other Christians do. For a lot of people, that critical moment of testing comes with something that God "does" or, more correctly in many cases, allows. Note on allowing things. If there was a bank robbery today, I allowed it. If there was a murder today, I allowed it. If there was a rape today, I allowed it. If there was a lie today, I allowed it. I allowed all of those things because I didn't stop them. Granted, I didn't know about most of them, and I was probably powerless to stop them had I known. So I'm off the hook. Nobody will write a bad article in the newspaper because I didn't act to stop a theft in London. Nobody is cursing my name because they were raped in Perth. God doesn't get the same break. He knew it all was happening, he even knew it would happen so long ago. He also had the power to stop it, drawback of the whole omnipotence thing, I suppose. So the same way you would blame me if I was babysitting your toddler and just watched him stick his hand in a mousetrap we blame God. (I don't particularly like toddlers, btw, so don't ask me to babysit. Just don't do it.) So we go about our lives thinking that God has it all under control and is doing things "in his timing" until our best friend is killed by a drunk driver, or our spouse gets cancer, or, or, or, ... Then we shake a well deserved fist at heaven and cry out, "Why did you do this?" Again, more correctly, "Why did you let this happen?" I have thoughts on this. They may appear to be random ones, but that's okay here.

I can't speak for rain or floods or drought or hurricanes or tornados, but those drunk drivers, drug addicts, crazed gang members, Enron executives, etc., they all have free will. If God stop the free will actions of those who would, purposefully or not, hurt those whose free will was to worship him could he justly, and remember that justness is one of his character attributes, leave his worshipers with free will. "As long as you choose to do what I want you to do you're free to do whatever you want, because it's what I want. If you choose to do something I don't want you to do then free will is gone for you and I'll take you over and make you do the right thing, it's the good thing about being omnipotent." He could still sort us out, he'd know if it were him or us. I don't think he can play us that way, though. I think he prevents him from doing it. (Character of God.) And what's more ...

I don't think he really cares. Our character and eternity is where his concern rest. The great, Godly plan for most people is that they die. I just don't see where the type of death is in consideration next to the type of life. I also can't see why the Army would really care if you got the dinner you really wanted on the battlefield. The do care that you get fed. Sorry, sir, we're all out of lobster. Hell is for demons, people will go there. It's not why hell was made, but Godly justice demands that some people will end up there. A natural consequence of free will is that some will rebel. A natural consequence of rebellion is suffering. For us to be able to worship meaningfully, and I mean that marionette worship means nothing, it must be done in our free will so ultimately we must face suffering. I have to work to get a paycheck. I wouldn't do it if they didn't pay me. I "suffer" the work for the blessings of my check. I suffer in life for the blessings of an eternal relationship with God. God gives a better return than my boss. I cannot exptect monetary blessings without putting up with the work, and I can even find my way to a thankful heart when payday comes and the bills are due. "Thank you for the work I hated, I hope you have more for me next week." If we recognize the suffering for what it is, an offshoot of our free will relationship with God, we can get to the place Paul was at, and be thankful in persecution.

Hitler rose to power and started what would become a world war and a terrible genocide.
God did a good job that day.
A plague swept over Europe and killed over a quarter of the population.
God did a good job that day.
A tsunami swept through the Indian Ocean and killed thousands.
God did a good job that day.
A hurricane hit the gulf coast and destroyed the entire region.
God did a good job that day.
Terrorist flew planes into buildings on 9/11.
God did a good job that day.
President Bush pushed through unconstitutional provisions that took away our protected rights following 9/11.
God did a good job that day.
My dad's cancer has gotten way worse, he stopped chemo because it's not effective, he can no longer take care of himself, he placed himself on a list for hospice care, he's just waiting to die. I hate today.
God did a good job today.

Insurance again

I have a friend currently in the hospital for an extended stay. Sitting by his bed overnight I talked with his wife about insurance in America. They've been through this before without insurance, this time with. Her insight -- without insurance he'd have been home days ago. The hospital, in her experience, will do the minimum treatment they can get away with because they expect most people to file bancruptcy and they won't get paid, but treatment still costs them. If you file bancruptcy with insurance they still get most of the money due them from the insurance company.

I guess the quality of treatment is the difference insurance makes in a major illness / accident. Sad, but substantial.

Barry Bonds*

Let's have a bicycle race. Rules are all bikes have to be pedal powered, no cutting corners on the track, no malicious contact. Easy enough. I'll show up in a moped, remember those, pedal powered and, uh, engine assist.

Bonds gots skills. He just knew he wasn't man enough without a little "assist." I say give him the record. When it's all done let's see:

Bonds, 1032*

and at the bottom of the page:

*not man enough without the juice.

Health Care / Insurance

So I don't get it. Obviously, the industry has to make money. Premiums, deductibles, etc. have to cover, not just the cost of care, but also the costs of administration and salaries for those pesky insurance salesman. I recently reviewed some old data about health care costs and, assuming that only the rates have changed and not the percentages, have developed some questions that I'd like to find answers to. I may have to print them out the next time I have to sit through an insurance meeting at work.

There is an average dollar figure for actual cost of health care. This is what it would cost if it were just out of pocket. Ignoring the effect of insurance companies contracting lower rates, I'm just looking at what actually gets paid. In other words, I realize that if you walk into a doctor's office you'll pay more than the insurance gets charged, but let's just pretend insurance didn't exist and providers would take the same money.

Approximately 95% of households spend more on insurance every year than the actual health care costs. I personally average hundreds of dollars per year on routine health care, not counting exceptional injury. Insurance premiums alone for an individual are upwards of $4000. That differential is why all the insurance people get paid. Only about 3% of households have health care costs each year that exceed base insurance costs by 10X. Remember that your employer is paying the bulk of the premium, your $60 per month is a pitance.

If you're one of the households exceeding payments by an extreme amount the insurance may be a windfall. An alternative would be getting the premiums your employer pays to someone else. This would leave you at risk, of course, in the event of any major injury or illness. That last statement implies that having insurance alleviates this risk. Does it, though?

What percentage of bankruptcies involve major medical expenses?
Of those, how many had insurance? (Which didn't protect them financially.)
More to the point:
Of households in any given income bracket, say yours, who suffer a major medical problem and have some standard insurance through their employer, what percentage still file for bankruptcy?
Same question for those without insurance.

I found quite a bit of data that looked like any major medical problem was as likely to send you to bankruptcy court whether you were insured or not. New bankruptcy laws now and I have no idea how this will effect things in the future, but financial devistation is devistating whether you can file or not.

Insurance costs thousands of dollars per year. What gets covered and what doesn't on your next potential policy? Even if it gets covered, how? 80/20 split? 20% of $30,000 will still break most households.

I'd rather see a plan where instead of paying my premiums that money would just go into a flex fund. Use it or lose it. Any unused monies to go to a general healthcare fund. It would encourage routine medical because that amount of money is way more than most people would ever spend anyway.

Bravery

Four things to consider. On one extreme there's BRAVADO. Then, INNOCENT FOOLHARDINESS. Next is BRAVERY. Finally, COURAGE.

Bravado. This is false bravery, and it's a show. In some cases it may be noble. In an extreme emergency, when lives are on the line it may give others a (false) sense of security and allow cool heads to prevail. Mostly, it's just some fool's pride.

Innocent Foolhardiness. This is close to Bravado in showiness, but not for others benefit, and close to Bravery in it's fearlessness. A good portion of time it's just ignorance. Such as someone crossing boundaries at the zoo to pet the pose next to the bear.

Bravery. This is a lack of reasonable fear. Some people just aren't scared. These are the people who put themselves in risky situations that others won't. Often, there is the attitude that the worst that could happen is you die. Brave people are often working for a cause, and in that respect are very close to being Courageous, except they're not overcoming fear, they don't have it.

Courage. Courageous people are afraid, but not cowards. Courage is always noble, and always a reaction to the greatest fear. Courage is the putting of others wellbeing above your own.

Bravado will step into a bullring, on the far side from the bull, so everyone will see him in with the bull. Bravery will think, "What an idiot" and go in to get him because he knows the bull and is in control. Foolhardiness will think that was cool and jump into the ring, hoot, holler and flail arms because it's fun after eight beers. Courage, after yelling cautions from the safety of the fence will run in when the bull feigns charges. His fear for himself is great, but his fear is greater for what will happen to the Fool if he does not act.

ADHD

This one kills me. I think mostly it's a crock. Everyone has impulses. Many of mine are to backhand kids diagnosed with ADHD. I control those impulses. So far. Controlling impulses isn't easy. These I suppress because of outside influence. There are laws and if I started backhanding unruly children I'd go to jail. That's a consequence. It is applied with consistency. It has a meaningful impact on my behavior. I don't backhand children who deserve it, I do have the impulse. I often wonder how much of ADHD is really just parents who suck at being parents. Without the law in place I assure you I would be backhanding a few children. Many homes have no law in place. There are no consequences for actions. Without consequences there is no reason to curb impulse. And we arrive at children with no impulse control. They are diagnosed with ADHD, wrongly because it's not caused by any chemical imbalance but by neglect in the home. Well meaning doctors prescribe drugs found to be effective in cases of actual ADHD, but these drugs are inefective when the problem is lack of parenting. There have, apparently, always been ADHD children. There have not always been the problems associated with them. In older, less "enlightened" times, stark discipline was well able to distinguish between actual cases of ADHD and children who lacked discipline at home. Even now I know children who will behave for me but run rampant over their parents. They know, beyond any doubt, that I will punish them if they misbehave. They know, beyond any doubt, that their parents will not. This even seems to have worked with the actual ADHD children, to an extent. But that was an extent that curtailed the problems we commonly see now. And that was without any drugs. Anyone doubting this should interveiw an old teacher, especially a nun. Knuckle rapping works to maintain order. Even with kids who have poor impulse control it gives pause. A moment of thought about the impending consequence for unruly behavior. And that often results in impulse control in children who have poor impulse control. Mostly, though, I think it is a problem with adults that manifests in their children. If you are ill equipped for parenting, which takes much time, effort, care, planning, participation, relief, backup, etc. then you should definitely refrain from having six children. As the problem is most often an imbalance, not in the head of the child, but in the head of the home, perhaps that is where some consequences should be directed. In Arizona parents are responsible for the torts of their children. Perhaps what we should do is call the police and file for disturbing the peace. If you can't control your children that's your problem, don't make it mine. Let them run amuck at home, not in the restaurant where I'm trying to enjoy a meal.

Junk e-mail

I'm happy to say that, although the bored 25 year old girls don't seem to want to talk to me anymore, probably because nobody wants to sell me any ED drugs this week, but, oh yeah, happy to say that my home refinance loan has been preapproved. By about a dozen people so far. If I could just figure out a way to refinance with all of them at once and then declare bankruptcy.

About Cool

There are two kinds of cool. Real and imagined. Some people just are cool. I don't know what really makes them that way, they just are. Some people want to be cool so bad they'll do anything to get that quality, the one I don't know what is, that will make them cool. You see this all the time in teenagers, and it makes a certain bit of sense that they'd be going through some identity issues. What gets me is that you see it in so many adults. I guess nobody knows what that cool quality is, really. Evidently, a lot of people were counting on it being the iphone. They waited in line for days, for a phone. I guess to be cool you have to have all the right stuff. Unless, of course, you're one of the real cool people who just are cool. Until we find a way of injecting the imaginary cool people with the real cool quality I suppose there'll be all those people trying to fake it with gadgets. Now a question for all the fakers, one of which I'm sure I am. If you are so insecure with yourself that you have to buy all the tools of cool in the hope that you will then somehow be cool because you've got the stuff, can you ever really be cool at all? Maybe the first step to actually being cool is to accept yourself and stop worrying about whether anybody thinks you're cool.

Things about the "war on terror"

What annoys me about our present “war”

Politics is an attempt to change an opponents policies utilizing logic, pressure, reward, influence, etc. War is an attempt to overpower the opponent so that you can implement your own policy. The use of politics to reach an end of armed conflict is perfectly legitimate. In that regard war can be seen as a political tool. However, war should always be what it is. It should always be a legitimate attempt to conquer. The political part comes in the form of motivation. “Let’s solve this at the table while you still have power before I solve this on the battlefield and you have no power.” In this present conflict we have, and have had, are highest military powers on sight acting for political purposes. There is much talk, it is in fashion, about “winning the peace.” It is not a new idea. Sun Tsu’s The Art of War addressed it. If I remember correctly by going to war we lost the peace. The idea now is to win the war. This should be a decisive effort. Perhaps I don’t remember so well. Perhaps Sun was wrong. And I realize he didn’t actually write it. What we have now is a combination of aborted politics and aborted military action. All in all, just an abortion. Unfortunately, since the abortion is being conducted by our military, our militants are in the middle of it. We have fought in such a politically motivated way that one of our concerns was minimizing the American body count, but on a day to day basis. We didn’t go in, overwhelm and secure. To do so would have cost too many American lives that month. It’s the same as the financial policies that brought down so many huge corporations. I would have rather had ten times as many dead at the beginning and on third the dead now. And I think those go together. And I think that’s why Sun wrote what his student wrote. And I think he was right when someone else wrote it. And I think the best course of action now is to do the job, do it fully, and do it forcefully so that it gets done. I think the second best course of action is to get out without doing the job. I think that would be mocking our dead, but it wouldn’t be making more of them.

Speaking of mocking our dead. I am also mildly sickened by the media’s, and to some extent the concerned families’, use of the term hero. The word means something to me. I checked in the dictionary, and granted I use an old dictionary, I prefer them, and it says I’m right. Being a hero means you did something extraordinarily courageous. We send out ten patrols on the same route on some certain day. The first nine complete the route without incident. The last goes along without incident until it’s blown up by a roadside IED, killing the entire crew. They are touted in the back home press as heroes. They did the same thing the other nine crews did. That means they did nothing extraordinary and therefore nothing heroic, in as much as their patrol was concerned. The only thing they did that was different from the rest was dieing. That brings us to the common meaning of hero. As commonly used in our press, hero just means dead. In reality, many of those who die in war may be heroes. But dieing didn’t make heroes of them. I’d love to see some news reports that honor those who die by reporting what did make them heroes. By reporting all who die as heroes our press only mocks the heroism of those who truly are heroic, including those heroes who die in roadside bombings and are called heroes only because they died.

The third thing is the use, or overuse, of the term terrorist. I’m not sure how we define it. Clearly, we mean our enemies. My mind, though, continues to return to the earlier discussion of fairness. I guess I’m a little concerned with absolutes. For instance, what is terrorism in absolute terms. From there I can work back toward reality, which rarely exists in absolutes. Are we the greatest terrorists of all time? I refer to the mass killing of civilians perpetrated by the United States against the Japanese. I don’t think anyone could make a decent argument against it in terms of lives. By simple numbers I think we’re ahead having dropped the bombs, on both sides. The Japanese warriors were tenacious. They would have killed many, many more American warriors had the war continued. That is clear. It is also clear that many, many more Japanese warriors would have died had the war continued. In terms of numbers, I think that more Japanese soldiers would have died than Japanese civilians who did die. So a great number of military lives were saved on both sides. We traded those military lives for civilians. Non-combatants. We killed people who weren’t fighting us to save our own soldiers’ lives and the lives of the soldiers who were fighting us. We call the tragedies of 9/11 great acts of terrorism because of the human toll, and because that was just people like you and me who went to work that morning, or were simply traveling, people who were non-combatants. We killed teens and preteens, the elderly who had to be held up when they walked and mothers suckling their infants, and their infants. When I step back to where my terms of absolute are and try to decide what an act of terror is, without the luxury of whether the person(s) committing the act are our enemies, I am ashamed of us. And that statement extends past WWII. The actions of our troops in non-battle conditions and the CIA’s recent “Extraordinary Rendition,” as well as other, long standing policies regarding clandestine ops, or a sniper’s SOP concerning POWs.

Lastly is that there is a war on terror at all. President Bush, Sr., got our troops onto the Saudi peninsula on an explicitly temporary basis. That has changed to semi-permanent at the very least. The presence of our (infidel) troops there is sacrilege for Islamics. This isn’t because they took a vote after we went there and decided they didn’t want us. This was part of their religion before the discovery of the new world. Not since we got there, not since the formation of this nation, not since the colonization of the Americas by (predominately) Christians, but since the time that the terms of their religion were set out. We knew this. Sr. put us there knowing the sentiments it would cause, and Presidents and Congresses on both sides of the aisle have kept us there knowing it. Our politicians knowingly went looking for a fight and got it. Our presence on their holy ground is the origin of the terror we now fight. Our continued presence is it’s nourishment. Withdrawing our troops from the Saudi peninsula would do more, and be cheaper, than all previous and current efforts combined toward eliminating the scourge of terrorism.

Religion (3)

This is about alligience, doctrine and denominations. Mostly its just an attempt to put this thought down clearly. That may not be happening, but that's the attempt.

In many ways it is close to identity. At the outset of this nation, we had Virginians who were American. I am an American who lives in Arizona. Post Civil War we saw a change in identity that way. But in terms of the church: Am I a Christian who is Baptist? Am I a Presbyterian who is Christian? Can I be a Christian with no affiliation? Maybe a Catholic but not Christian? That last one we see all the time. Social congregations, or at least people in the congregation who are only there for social reasons. Whether that be for socialization or to relieve social pressures, 'cause after all you should be in church. The third one, no affiliation, I see more and more often. It's not just the freaks anymore. A lot of people who are fed up with the crap at church. I think there is a cause and effect relationship with those social goers. But the first two, I think there's a line there that's been so blurred that nobody knows there's a line anymore. I think there's a critical difference between those two. The difference? Those who grow, and those who don't.

We've gotten together into groups, decided what is right amongst ourselves, and written it down. It's the writing that ruins it. We're people. We know that if it's written then it must be true. So we continue to follow what we wrote. For the most part what we wrote about the Bible has become more supreme than the Bible itself. After all, any idea or plan that we take to the congregation gets screened past our doctrinal statement, not past our Bible. That's because our doctrinal statement explains what the Bible means. We don't really understand the Bible when we read it, but our doctrinal statements are in a language we actually speak, in a form we actually speak it in. KJV is great, but I've never heard anyone speak that way, except when they pray, or do Shakespear, or are joking around about the Bible or Shakespear. So we go with our easy to understand doctrines because they're written down so they must be true and right. So who's right? Well the Baptists have their doctrine, they're right, just ask 'em. The Presbyterians have their doctrine, they're right, just ask 'em. The Catholics have their doctrine, they're right, just ask 'em. So far I'm okay with this. But then I notice that the Baptists are Baptist, not Presbyterian or Catholic. Same with the others. In fact, every denomination that isn't Baptist isn't Baptist. And Baptists aren't any other denomination except Baptist. It turns out that Baptists are the only Baptists, even when I thought there might be some other Baptists somewhere else, no, no other Baptists except Baptists. Same for the others. There are all these different denominations because the denominations are different. I said I wanted to state this clearly, and you can't get much clearer than that. When I was in grade school we studied math. We would get quizes to keep us motivated. On the quizes were math problems. The whole class got the same problems. A lot of different answers wound up on the teachers desk. I don't remember any-one who turned in an answer because they thought it was wrong, that didn't start until middle school. Inevitably the teacher would only accept one answer as correct, claiming that was the way of it. Only one answer was true and correct. I think God is as bad about that as my math teacher. My math teacher wasn't math, but God is God. He knows what is of him and what isn't. He knows his desires and his commands. He knows his standards and how plainly he laid them out. Out of all the denominations out there, with all their subtle differences, and all that aren't so subtle, there is the possibility, and I won't even say likelihood, that as many as one is right. At least all but one are wrong, and probably more than that. Only one more, but still, that's more. So I'm going to say this, and I'm saying to you, directly to you: Your church, and for that matter your personal, doctrines are wrong. I mean that in the way of no partial credit. You shouldn't take it to mean that your church doctrine says no sacrificing babies so you'd better start sacrificing babies. Please keep that part. Those doctrines were set by a group of people that were all at their individual points along the journey of getting to know God. I don't imagine that any, and certainly not all were at the point in that journey we'd call a finish line. So the standard that we use, in each of our churches, except maybe one, is flawed, but that's our standard. If ever we, in our personal lives, come to an intimate knowledge of God and, in our communion with him come to understand a better truth than what is offered by the church doctrine, what happens? We can share it, and hope to overcome the reluctance of the church to change the doctrine, which has been tried and shown itself true for all this time. After all, we're the one church that's got it right. That reluctance is great, and it should be. A lot of people make the claim of knowing a better truth, that's how a lot of denominations got started. Usually, I don't think it came from a deep, personal, intimate relationship with God where he showed you something. In that regard denominations are good, but even that is bad. We shouldn't be thrown about by every new doctrine, we should be solid. But we should be solidly on the truth. Instead we're solidly on what was given to us by the last generation of Christians of our particular affiliation. These differences that we take as truth on a church by church basis are huge. I'm not talking about which hymnal we're going to use. When we listen to someone talk about their openly homosexual lifestyle, will we ordain them? Some churches, holding it out as the truth of God, say yes. Other churches, holding it out as the truth of God, say no. I don't think both are the truth of God.

So there's the question of alligance. I know it's hard to see. You read your Bible. You see what God says a pastor needs to be. Among other things is sexually moral, by God's standard, not Cosmo's. You read through, cover to cover. You see what God's standard of sexual morality are. This guy has just told you that he's actively gay. You happen to be in one of the congregations that accepts this. Where is your alligance? Now it's not a question of homosexuals. Your perspective new pastor wants to give the congregation a feel for him. So he tells you he's single, but dating. He has a beautiful girlfriend and they're talking marriage so there could be wedding bells just around the corner. Of course, in the mean time they're living together and checking their sexual compatibility because that's such an important part of marriage. That's okay with your church doctrine. What about you? Do you go with the standards set by that group of guys or the one you find directly in God's word? What about the leaders in your church?

For the most part I have to think that the church leaders would support the church doctrine. They got to be leaders because the bought in to the doctrine, it is how they believe, it is what they teach. They teach the congregation to believe the doctrine. Because it's written down, so it must be true. In this way it perpetuates itself. Unfortunately, it is most peoples great aspiration to rise to the lofty heights of the church doctrine. That's not what they say. They say the lofty heights of God's word. It's just that in reality, in practice, they aspire to doctrine as Bible.

I've worked with kids. I've worked with kids in church. In church one of the most disheartening things I heard, and heard often was the answer, "Because that's what I was told" to the question, "Why do you believe that?" There you have young people developing a relationship with the church, not a relationship with God. And an alligance to the church, not to God. That's how you get a congregation that will confirm that single, sexually active and proud of it because she/he is hot candidate.

Back to that revelation. The other option is breaking from the church. Maybe just a little, maybe just here and there. Maybe more. Maybe it's a question of having alligance to God before and above alligance to this or that congregation or denomination. My statement for today: There are those who grow and those who don't, the difference is where your alligance is. You may grow in your church, you may grow in your social standing, you may be revered because of your speaking, teaching, singing or instrumental abilities,but you will not grow in God if you are not in him.

Politics, Sudan, Darfur

A couple of days ago President Bush gave a speech about Sudan. In it he raised sanctions. One of his sound bites was "we will not turn a blind eye to the genocide" happening in the Darfur region. It sounds good. Really, though, it is just a continuation of our standing policy. We don't turn a blind eye to it, we do turn our good eyes away. As far a good, non-made-up intelligence goes, we have more reason to go into the Sudan than we had for going into Iraq. Human rights issues that make Iraq seem like a bad day at Disneyland. Well established connections with terrorist organizations. No WMD, but then, no WMD for Iraq either.
We stood by, averting our healthy eyes, during their civil war. We stand by now as several farming peoples are decimated. We failed to act when it was Christians being killed, we don't act now when it's Islamics. They have horrific human rights violations, but we don't act over horrific human rights violations. They have ties to terrorists, but we don't act over terror connections. We don't seem to act over anything, oh, they don't have oil.

As Americans one of the basic tenets of our political and social beliefs is that government only has power by the consent of the governed. I can pretty much guarantee that tribes being wiped out in the Darfur region aren't consenting. There are governmental and government sponsored human rights attrocities going on right now, as they have been going on for four long, deadly years. We don't have to agree with every other form of government on this planet, and they don't have to agree with ours. But our theory of government self authorizes us to take action when we know something like this is taking place, regardless of what the rest of the world thinks about it. Instead of acting because its right to do so we stand by, shaking our finger. Perhaps its unrelated, but the Darfuri don't effect us economically.

Religion (2b)

We can also look within the group of Israel to a position and correlate that with a present person in like position. Let's look at kingship. Samuel's discourse to all Israel, 1 Sam. 12, "if both you and the king who reigns over you follow the Lord your God -- good! ... Yet if you persist in doing evil, both you and your king will be swept away" and 13:13-14, "You have not kept the command the Lord your God gave you; if you had, he would have established your kingdom over Israel for all time. But now your kingdom will not endure." We can see that God, who does not change, had conditions regarding the kingship. Perpetuation over generations depended upon obedience and adherence to God's rules for the kingship. When God's conditions weren't kept, the kingship was removed. As that applied in the OT over the great length of time regarding generations, at present it applies to us as individuals in the NT. God has rules for leaders. We find them listed in 1 Tim. 3 and Titus 1. These "qualifications" aren't a set of achievements and once attained you get a placard to put on the wall and refer people to for your credentials. They're written in the present imperative, as constantly necessary. Not as we must breathe to live but rather as we must be breathing to live. It doesn't matter that you breathed last week. You have to be breathing now. If you stop breathing, then you suffocate and die. It doesn't matter that your pastor used to not be a drunkard, he has to not be a drunkard now. It doesn't matter that your pastor used to be sexually moral, he has to be sexually moral now. It doesn't matter that your pastor didn't used to steal, he has to not be given to dishonest gain now. They're God's rules. They're God's requirements. It is imperative that your pastor meet these qualifications. Initially he must prove himself over a period of time before ordination. That is not to say that God's requirements are completed. He must meet those requirements now. If he doesn't meet the requirements God laid out, then he cannot be in that position. God set things out in the OT. When Saul was disobedient God didn't just remove Saul, he removed Saul's lineage. It wasn't a question of killing Saul and the bad king wasn't king anymore. God removed Saul line from the kingship. He left it so Saul's line had no claim on leadership. So it is today for a person as it was then for the generations. If your pastor doesn't meet the requirements God said he must meet, then he simply isn't a pastor in God's eyes. It doesn't matter what piece of paper you can pull off his wall and hold up for God to see. It doesn't matter how many people in the congregation like him. If he isn't what he must be to be pastor, then he must not be pastor. Because Saul didn't meet God's requirements the kingship did not continue in his line. If your pastor doesn't meet God's requirements then the pastorship doesn't continue in his life. In many areas the principle of proving yourself responsible in the little areas to have responsibility in the big areas applies. Was your pastor a married man while ordained and then went through a divorce? Does he fail to meet the fatherly duties that are required of all fathers? Are his children sexually promiscuous, drug abusing criminals? Then he doesn't manage his own family well and/or his children are wild and disobedient. See the parenthetic I Tim. 3:5.

If you are part of a congregation where the pastor doesn't meet God's explicit standards then you are part of a church that is a perversion of God's will. Leadership that doesn't meet God's standards cannot possibly instruct the congregation in God's will or direction. They are in open rebellion against it. Any that have remained because they weren't sure what to do: First, cannot follow the clear word of God distinctly and explicitly provided for us; Second, are obviously not open to the wooing of the Holy Spirit who would, in the event that your pastor was not able to understand the clearly written (and it is quite clear in Greek, and if your pastor is preaching based on the English translations and all the traditional meanings -- well, that's a whole other blog) instruction God has given us (btw: then he clearly can't ever have been holding firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught) (Holy Spirit who would ...) be urging him out of the pulpit so that a man who truly is of God could step in and lead righteously.

Is it important to have righteous leadership who are in line with the word and will of God?
Is it important to not have unrighteous leadership who are out of line with the word and will of God? (Important to note: In many instances lack of qualification isn't because the person is unrighteous but merely because they haven't proven their ability to lead or have proven an inability to effectively lead in lesser circumstances. This doesn't make them dispicable people, it just means that they have been unable to rise to the elevated standard God has for his leaders. In most cases it just means that they only meet the lower standards that you and I are only meeting.)

I have been under pastors who went through a divorce -- merely couldn't manage the lesser responsibilities of personal family, whose children were sleeping with the hot young wives and other women of the church and beyond, and who left their familial responsibilities to pursue the greater purposes of God. I am definitely not under them now. I urge you to openly evaluate your leadership. Try to prevent the congregation from being led astray, even with the best of intentions. Definitely don't led yourself be led estray.

Religion (2a)

I'm subdividing because this is just to establish an idea that is critical to the point.

Generally, this deals with OT allegory. See Gal. 4 Sarah/Hagar, etc.

Now look at Israel. Not the guy, but God's first son (Ex. 4:22). The chronicles of Israel over generations and millennia could just as well be the spiritual memoirs of an individual over years. That is certainly God's view of it (Hos. 11:1-4, and various other times God refers to the back-and-forth, on-again-off-again nature of Israel's spiritual life). This story of a people's spiritual life can be seen allegorically as the story of a person's spiritual life. Drawing close, then walking away, returning to find acceptance, forgiveness and intimancy. This is in holding with God's view of time: A day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years is as a day (Ps. 90, II Pet. 3). We see that, when dealing with God, time isn't such a fixed commodity. Peter was speaking of God's promises, elsewhere we see references to "God's time." All things happen in God's time, he does as he does when he is pleased to act. The promises we see in the Bible are generally given. That is, they are given to us as a collective, and not to me and you and you and you as individuals. If the latter were the case then God would have lied to all those who waited till death for the promises we still wait for. We have faith that all his promises will be fulfilled in his time. So about God's time, and his rules, and allegory.

God has rules for his people, those rules are aligned to his character. We can see those rules administered to the people Isreal over great lengths of time just as they are administered to a person (me, you, Bob down the street) over the course of one lifetime. (please continue to Religion 2b)

Religion (1)

I decided to do some overtly religious and political posts. So I'll name them that way, hope I can keep the numbers straight. BTW, NIV as a standard for references, others as noted.

The first point to make in any religious discourse is that we should all be at least five years old to be involved in any discussions. No offense to any three year olds out there, but I'm just not looking to you for sagely advice. I picked five years because by that time we should all understand what "fair" is. I've had the priviledge of working with groups of little kids and fairness is a big issue. It's really important when cookies come out. Little Mary wants all the cookies for herself, but doesn't want Joey to get all the cookies for hisself. That should be obvious because the two are mutually exclusive. Mary gets upset that Joey wants all the cookies and is aggressive in her contention that it's not fair for him to get them all. I state that if she gets them all then Joey won't get any. She understands. I ask if it would be fair for her to get them all and Joey to get none. She looks relieved because I finally get it. "Yes," she says, "that would be fair."

Names were changed to protect the guilty (read : rat children). Mary was only concerned about herself. Fair meant favorable to her. Likewise for Joey, but he's only an antagonist in this story. This is a blatant display of self-centeredness. All that matters is that she is taken care of no matter how many other people get screwed. That's not the way fair works. Fair is a rule that has the same result for all that have the same conditions. If Mary wants a cookie then she can have a cookie, if Joey wants a cookie then he can have a cookie. This works as long as you have more cookies than wants. If you have 20 cookies and 21 kids who want a cookie then the only fair thing is that no-one gets a cookie, then everyone gets the same bad deal. Except me, of course, I'm the adult, I get a cookie. We're staying quantum on this, I'll not entertain the idea of cutting 1/21 off of every cookie. There are compromises that work well for long term fairness. One kid goes without a cookie each day and at the end of 21 days each kid has had 20 cookies. Better long term results than at the end of 21 days each kid has had zero cookies and I gained 10 pounds. But those compromises mean one kid has to go without each day. Did I mention these are little kids. Not going to work. Those compromises are way better for the community, unless you're a hardcore nutritionist, in such case substitute apples for cookies. Sometimes the best fair we can have means somebody gets screwed everytime, and we're all better for it.

But I digress, this is a religious entry. God = cookies? No. That was all just to establish fair. To start talking religion, at least Christianity, we begin with love. The nature of love is not self-centered. Love is other-centered. But love is fair. It's not fair if I love you, the individual, above all other individuals and do things that are good for you at everyone else's expense. Though we are not bound by the Old Testament, it is an example of righteousness. It is the expressed character of God and, as God is love, is an expression of love. Now we get to the hard part. For this I'm talking about our physical existence and interaction with each other, so we'll overlook loving God. It's not about loving myself. It's not about loving my family. It's about loving my neighbor, I think Jesus summed up the whole of the law (read : expression of God's character) that way. Most of the laws of the OT dealt with either our relationship with God (overlooked for this discussion), or with how we (God's chosen, the Israelites in the case of OT, Christians for this purpose) get along as a community. Love is about putting the good of the community above my family and above myself. Doubt it? Read Dt. 21:18-21. Like most other putting someone to death issues, the reason isn't validation of one's self or revenge, it's protecting the society from the influence of pagan religions, contempt of God, or, as in this case, the degrading of societal standards of moral righteousness. See the great bulk of Paul's writing on the church being deceived and led away from pure doctrines, a process of debauchery -- archaic meaning. We have accepted boundaries. Someone pushes those boundaries and we become tolerant. Then those boundaries are the accepted norm and we have new boundaries that weren't acceptable at the beginning. Then the cycle repeats and we end up being tolerant of anything. When I was little it was tolerable for unmarried couples to live together. Then that became normal but gays living together was slanderous. Now that's normal and gay marriage is acceptable in some places. You just can't accept a rebelious son, you have to love your community more than you love your child. That observation being made, like sex and alcohol, things perfectly acceptable before God in and of themselves but capable of being misused to sinful ends, this tenent of Biblical Christianity (that true love entails a love of others and places the good of community above the good of individuals) is what is misused to form cults. I am not advocating cults. Have sex, but have it righteously. Drink alcohol, but drink it righteously. Love your community, but love it righteously.

A republican form of government.

I thought that our elected representatives were supposed to issue a vote in proxy for governmental affairs at the level of their office. So why do our congressmen, both Senate and House, vote strictly on what is good for the nation? (Their level of government.) Why do they, instead, vote for what is good for their constituency? My understanding is that those we send to Washington are to look after the whole country, those we send to Phoenix, remember -- I'm in Arizona, are to look after the best interest of the entire state, and so forth for county and city government. If our politicians would follow that precept, which I believe is evident in our political structure, wouldn't government be less expensive, more effective, more reactive to problems that do arise, and more proactive to forstall problems that are not yet adversly effecting us? Wouldn't the nation thrive if we had politicians who looked after one indivisible nation instead of their individual states? Wouldn't the states thrive if they were under the umbrella of a nation that was operating as it should? Wouldn't the states thrive if we had politicians looking after the single state instead of the one county they represent? Instead we have politicians whose main concern is for themselves and their work is toward furthering their own carreers by bringing back benefits for their voting constituency at the expense of the greater population. On a personal level we call that theft. When someone breaks into your home and takes things that belong to you because having them will benefit him we call him a criminal.

I'm so mean

Most people I know tell me I'm mean. I think that it's just a case of scocietal convolusion. Take the "Blonde Bombshell" for instance. She never has to open her own door, buy her own drink, ask for help or apologize. All this because of the way that men, and even some women, treat her based on her looks. This way of life isn't special for her, it's just normal. She doesn't think the people who do these things are out of the ordinary. So the few isolated people who don't treat her that way are, by comparison, mean. If I get pulled over for 80 in a 65 and the cop cites me for waste of finite resources then he's being really nice, 5 mph more and it was a felony and this citation doesn't even count as points against my license. Same sitcuation for the blonde and the cop was mean to write her up at all. My meanness amounts to a lack of lying. In reality I think it's mostly being nice. I don't offer rave reviews of an unpracticed performance that sucked. I say it sucked and you should have practiced. That's being honest, not mean. Encouraging people to continue not practicing so that they will never get really good, all the while decieving them into thinking that they are good, that just sets them up for failure on the braoder scale. In my opinion that is the real meanness. If I tell you three things you need to work on it's because masterning those things will improve your performance to a level you should be proud of. How many of your friends treat your failures as great accomplishments and encourage you to feel good about an effort you know to be grossly inferior. It's seams that that is the social definition of niceness.

Proving god(s)

I guess thats all the rage right now. I've heard "proofs" of god for some years, but now its prime time. It is my belief that the god of Christianity isn't supposed to be proven, he's supposed to be accepted without proof. How many Christians spend how much time coming up with how many hokey ways to prove god that are really just a bunch of bs? I've heard plenty that I believe but none that actually prove anything. (That means you can tell anecdote after anecdote that "proves" 1 + 1 = 2 and I'll believe you every time, but most won't really prove it.) For what it's worth the most impressive persuasive argument I've heard on the subject of religion belongs to the Hindu. In their system of belief as life beings reach higher planes of consiousness they reincarnate as higher beings, and the reverse, and if they obtain enlightenment as humans they get out of the reincarnation loop. By this most ancient of religous systems our current condition of deforrestation and overpopulation makes perfect sense and is quite encouraging. Perhaps I should convert, of course, I'd have to die first. (My apologies to anyone who realizes how symplistic the above is.)

Springtime

I live in Arizona so I don't get to enjoy the regular set of seasons. We have three: cold, dry heat, monsoon. Easter occurs in either cold or dry heat. We could have our Easter egg hunt early in the morning to avoid triple digit temperatures or we could suffer through a sunrise service in freezing rain. It just doesn't seem fair. I was born in Ohio. We had Spring there. Mild, warm days. Cool nights. Comforting breeze. You could count on it year after year. Here we get that a day or two at a time as the weather fluctuates between highs in the 50s and 90s. On Tuesday you could plan a fun filled day at the lake to take the edge off the sweltering heat only to cancel on Thursday because nobody wants to smim when the forcasted high is 62. Well, nobody around here anyway, there are a few people who come in from Minnessota and, ... brr! At least I don't have to put up with snow.
That's my schpeil on weather. I was thinking that someday in the far off future I might write about something that matters. I dunno.

copyrights

I guess the first thing on my mind, after starting out on this, is copyrights. I like 'em. There's a special provision in the US Constitution for 'em. If you want to keep your writing copyrighted, fine, do it. You just can't do it here. Anything on your own blog is another matter. Post here and you made it public, despite any statements you may make to the contrary. I hate seeing disclaimers on forums where someone posts to a public site and wants to enjoy a copyright on what they say. If you want your thoughts to be privately owned post them on your privately owned site. Allow public access and maintain copyright. Get on a public forum, or comment on a site owned by someone else, and you lose it. Anybody remember when the internet was about the sharing and open exchange of information and ideas? I think that was before internet lawyers.

General Stuff

I'll post my thoughts and opinions, you're welcome to do the same. I probably won't spend too much time trying to be pc so people with fragile emotions should beware. If you just read what I write and take it at face value you should be okay. If you want to be offended, and some people are just like that, then I can all but guarantee that you will be. I encourage the intelligent voicing of opposing points of view that add something of value. I'll periodically remove comments that are just rants - my standards apply as to which is which. Also, I definitely won't be camping out on this, so dialog could take some time.

Happy reading.

Tim