LEAVE
IT TO PEEVER
This
is not a time to pray and pay
– Bumper sticker of the week: There is always a price.
– Quote of the week: "Participate joyfully in the
sorrows of the world. We cannot cure the world of sorrows, but we can choose to
live in joy." Joseph Campbell
– I received 25 e-mails regarding my suggestion that it
may be time for a referendum to determine whether or not we should remain a
home rule municipality. Twenty-four were supportive of the notion to cough up a
referendum. One was supportive of continuing as a home rule city. The mayor
really should have had the city manager send the e-mail from the library.
– When the Democratic leaders in Congress follow along
with Bush's plan to eavesdrop on Americans, it's bad. When they give him more
money to run his own private wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it's worse. When
they refuse to end his shunning of habeas corpus, it's over. They're all
looking more and more the same. The best thing we can do this coming election
is boycott. Rather than another year as usual, 2008 could be a marker in
history. The year the citizens of the United States declared that we are better
off with no one leading us, rather than more of the same. What a year it would
be! "Is the system going to flatten you out and deny you your humanity, or
are you going to be able to make use of the system to the attainment of human
purposes?" Joseph Campbell
– Bush and Musharraf come from the same mold. It needs to
be broken.
– Sell the landfill. There's a novel idea. The only business
the county runs that makes any money, and the county board wants to sell it.
They must have been filled with Christmas Folly. The only buyer would be Waste
Management. Then watch our disposal rates go up.
– The city should put a tax on penis use. If they weren't
used so much, our STD's would go down.
– Speaking of taxes: They can't tax our dissent.
– The world doesn't need any more ministers. We need
doers. We need people who fashion their life after Christ. To say less and do
more. This is a radical way of life that cannot be measured by the size of a
congregation or the splendor of a cathedral. This is working on the street with
the poor. There is no need for a robe or a collar. They'll know who you are not
by your words, but by your actions. Then you can proudly call you're a
Christian, following in the footsteps of Christ. Then they can see what it is
you're doing, and people can make their own judgments about how righteous or
charitable it might be. Until that happens, a minister is wasting everyone's
energy and time, hiding behind a pulpit, begging for more money to build a
bigger building and pay themselves more. Each year they slide further down on
the "significant profession" poll. They become more distant from the
model Christ demonstrated for us as people who should give their possessions
away and follow Him. And He didn't go to the country club or the temple, He
went to the street. He declared those people His brothers and sisters, and did
what He could to help. That's our calling. Sitting in that pew on a Sunday
morning should be a time to rest and plan, not a time to pray and pay.
– Why is it those who are fighting for truth and justice
are often assassinated? People begin to think that evil is prevailing. Often,
those fighting for justice, equal rights, freedom, are killed for their
efforts. Look at Christ, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Bobby Kennedy, Che
Guevara, Benazir Bhutto. Evil shot them down. One gets the notion that evil
triumphs over good. But that's not so. If the liberators of the world
retaliated, then evil wins. You have to hold yourself up, stay out of the
quicksand of killing, guns, revenge. I had a guy e-mail me about my advocating
non-violence. He said if l wasn't man enough to defend myself and my family, he
would be willing to kill anyone trying to hurt us, as something of a favor. I
said no thanks. He just doesn't get it.