Birding

December 14, 2024 Leave a comment

Thanksgiving morning Toby woke up to noise and smells. He got out of bed and went downstairs in his PJs. The noise and smells were coming from the kitchen. His mother, aunt Susie and grandma Evans were talking and cooking. His seven-year-old sister Tilly was sitting on the counter singing one of her happy songs.

In the family room, Uncle Kevin and his father were sitting at a card table. Grandpa was sitting in the big chair reading a book. Toby went over to the card table.

“Hey Tob,” said Uncle Kevin.

“What are you doing?” Toby asked.

“We’re playing Risk,” replied his father.

“Can I play?” Toby asked.

“I think this game is a bit too hard for you,” his father replied. “We’ll play a different game later.”

Grandpa called Toby to come over and sit on his lap. Five-year old Toby did just that. He wanted to know what grandpa was looking at.

“It’s A Year-Round Guide to Indiana Bird Watching,” grandpa told him.

“Why you reading that grandpa?

 “I like birds, Tobias. Do you?”

“Uh-huh.” Toby rubbed his eyes and lifted the book to see the pictures. “What’s that?’ He pointed to the page.

“That’s a Dark-eyed Junco,” grandpa replied. “It says here that they like to eat seeds, insects and berries.”

“Huh. His name is Junco?”

“Yes. If you were a bird, I’d call you a Blue-eyed Tobias.” Grandpa smiled.

Toby turned the page. “Why do you like birds, grandpa?”

“Birds are special creatures. They seem to be wherever we are, as if God wanted to make sure we notice them. They are free and at the same time totally dependent on God and His created order.

“And there are so many kinds of birds, Tobias.” Grandpa flipped through the pages. “They bring color and sound to our lives. Seeing them and hearing them is proof that nature is healthy. I try to spot a bird by its coloring and by its songs and calls.”

“Birds have songs?”

“They sure do. Male birds sing to attract female birds. They also sing to scare off other birds from their territory and to bond with mates and young’uns. You want to hear a Mourning Dove Song?”

“Yeah.”  

Grandpa took a deep breath, formed his mouth and went “coo-AH-oo coo-coo”. He waited and then again “coo-AH-oo coo-coo.”

“The Mourning Dove keeps repeating this song until a female is attracted. That’s how I met your grandmother.” Toby’s eyes lit up when he saw grandma smile.

“Bird experts can tell the species of a bird by just listening to its song. Each species has its own song.”

“What’s speecheese?”

“A species is a way to name animals that are alike and have babies like them. Let’s see,” he found the page. “It says here that the Dark-eyed Junco is a species of Junco, a group of small, grayish sparrows.”

“It also says that Male Dark-eyed Juncos sing a sweet, high-pitched trill that sounds similar to the songs of the Chipping Sparrow and Pine Warbler. And during the winter, Juncos come to backyard feeders for millet and bird seed. I saw one at my bird feeder this morning.”

Toby looked over at the kitchen. “Let’s see if your mother has something for you to eat.” Grandpa moved Toby to his feet, got up, and the two of them went into the kitchen.

Toby was given a yogurt by his mother. Eating it, he watched Grandpa put his finger into the cranberry sauce, taste it and pucker his lips. Then grandpa put his finger into the mashed sweet potatoes, tasted it and said “Yum!” And then he put his finger into the pumpkin pie mix, tasted it and said “mm-mmm.”

When he reached for the stuffing, Grandma, hands on her hips, said, “Shoo you two. Come back when we’re ready to eat, in about two hours.”

“Let’s go for a walk Toby,” Grandpa said. “Get dressed in warm clothes. We’re going birding.”

A voice in the next room said, “Dad, the weather man said that central Indiana is 30 degrees and cloudy.”

Before Toby left the kitchen his mother said, “Go make your bed first and then put on your corduroy pants and blue sweater and then comb your hair.”

Toby shot upstairs and came back down two minutes later. His mother looked him over and then had grandpa put on his winter coat, his gloves, and the knitted hat that grandma made for him.

Outside, grandpa went over to his car and took out a pair of binoculars. He showed Toby and said “Maybe we will see a cardinal today.”

As they walked down two blocks past houses, they saw no birds. But then Grandpa spotted a Mourning Dove on a roof. He handed Toby the binoculars after adjusting the focus. “Let’s wait here and listen.”

When the dove began its song, Toby was transfixed until the dove flew out of sight.

They walked to the end of the street and came to a T-intersection. On the other side of the crossroad was open farmland. Wind whistled through the field of corn stalk stumps. Grandpa tied the ear flaps of Toby’s knitted hat below his chin.

To their left and down the road about forty yards was a small group of trees and undergrowth. “Let’s head there,” Grandpa told Toby.

As they walked along on the farm side of the road, Toby found a corn cob. Holding the smooth kernelled end, Toby showed grandpa the half-eaten end.

Grandpa looked it over and said, “Probably some squirrel started eating it. Or may be a goose.”

As they neared the trees, grandpa stopped and brought the binoculars to his eyes. He then handed them to Toby. “What do you see in that tree?” Grandpa pointed.

Toby looked and said, “The birds keep moving so I can’t see them.”

“They might be getting ready for winter,” Grandpa replied. They’re probably in a hurry to get out of the wind and get things settled for winter.”

Then Grandpa spotted a falcon perched on top of a utility pole that was about thirty yards down the road. He adjusted the focus of the binoculars and handed them to Toby. “Look up there. Can you see that falcon, Tobias?” He pointed to the electric pole.

Toby looked and said, “That is a falcon?”

Grandpa looked again. “Yes. A falcon known as the American Kestrel. I can tell by dark gray head, the rust-colored back and tail, the white cheeks and throat and blue-black bill. It’s the smallest of falcons. Some call it a “Sparrow Hawk”.”

“They like open areas without dense cover. He’s sitting up there to view the whole area for food. He’s scanning for prey on the ground. He’ll sit and wait. He’ll only attack when he’s sure that he will succeed. When he has prey in sight, he will either catch it on the ground or in flight. 

“In the summer months he’ll hunt and eat dragonflies, cicadas, beetles, grasshoppers, butterflies and moths, scorpions, and spiders. He’ll hover and capture insects in the air.

“In winter weather, like right now, he’ll hunt small mammals like mice, voles, shrews, and bats. And he’ll hunt small birds . . . like that little sparrow that just flew into the field. He pointed to it.

Grandpa let Toby use the binoculars to observe the falcon. “Let’s see what happens,” he said. “I wonder if that falcon noticed that small bird.”

A moment later, the falcon swooped down, grabbed the bird with his claws, and flew back to his high perch.

“Did you see that grandpa?” Toby asked.

“I sure did. He’s going back to his perch to eat it. Take another look.”

“Do birds eat other birds, grandpa?”

“They sure do. Birds of prey, like this falcon, have evolved to catch diverse things like insects, small mammals, and birds.

“I just remembered something. When I was a boy, Tobias, my father took me birding. One day he said “Frankie, there are so many birds but you never see dead birds. He told me that dead birds vanish because predators and scavengers come along and eat them. That’s why most bird bodies disappear. Creatures like foxes, badgers, ants, and birds of prey scavenge dead birds. The value of the bird’s life is returned to nature. Nature, he said, provides food for itself. Live birds and dead birds contribute to the lifecycle of our ecosystem.”

The sun never came out. The icy wind blowing across the open field made Toby’s nose and cheeks red. Grandpa said it was time for them to head back.

When they arrived home and opened the door, they were met with a rush of warm air, laughter, and savory smells. They saw the dining room table was set and the food ready to come out.

“Go wash your hands you two,” mom said. “We are ready to eat.”

When everyone had found their place at the table, mom asked grandpa to pray the blessing.

We give you thanks, most gracious God, for the beauty of
earth and sky and sea; for the richness of mountains, plains,
and rivers; for the songs of birds and the loveliness of flowers.
We praise you for these good gifts, and pray that we may
safeguard them for our posterity. Grant that we may continue
to grow in our grateful enjoyment of your abundant creation.
And now we ask Your blessing on this food we are about to eat. Amen.

A loud “AMEN!” followed.

Toby’s mother then handed Toby’s father a knife and said, “Carve the bird.” Toby gulped when he heard that. He looked over at grandpa.

“Tom turkey has been well fed. Now, he feeds us. Tobias, do you know which bird is at every meal?”

“No.”

“A swallow. Do you know which birds go to church a lot?

“No.”

“Birds of prey. What do you call a mean turkey?”

“I dunno.”

“A jerk-ey. What do you give a sick bird?”

“I dunno.”

“Tweetment! Did you hear about the owl with no friends?

“No.”

“He was owl by himself.”

The adults groaned. Toby wanted more.

After plates were filled and people were busy eating, Uncle Kevin asked Toby to tell everyone what he saw birding with grandpa.

“I saw a falcon. It came down and got a bird and ate it,” Toby exclaimed.

“Ewwwww!” Tilly didn’t like the thought.

Toby forked a piece a turkey, held it up, looked at his sister and said “Now I am a falcon!” and gobbled it down.

©Lena Johnson, Kingdom Venturers, 2024, All Rights Reserved

~~~~~

American Kestrel

American Kestral – Call of the Male

Dark-eyed Junco

Dark-Eyed Junco

Dark-eyed Junco Sounds, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Bird Sounds and Songs of the Dark-eyed Junco | The Old Farmer’s Almanac

Dark-eyed Junco | Audubon Field Guide

Easter Morning Central Indiana Bird Song

Easter Morning Central Indiana Bird Song

~~~~~

American Kestrel – Photo by John Mariani

Vermilion Flycatcher at Cattail Marsh in Beaumont, TX – Photo by John Mariani

Eastern Phoebe at Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge, TX – Photo by John Mariani

American Tree Sparrow, Northwest Ohio – Photo by American_Phoenix

The quirky nature humor of  https://rosemarymosco.com/

Northern Shrike, new cartoon by Rosemary Mosco.

~~~~~

The presence of birds in our lives brings good health. Indeed research shows that the richer and more various the birds in a neighborhood, the higher people’s satisfaction with life. Birdsong is the natural sound linked most strongly to reducing stress and promoting restoration, particularly when it is more diverse and people are prompted to notice it. Birds bring joy.

Five curious health benefits of dark midwinter, according to science | The Independent

~~~~~

Imagination sees a parallel universe.

Filed under Christianity, Holiday, nature, Ornithology, short piece, Short Story, Thanksgiving, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , , , ,

Work

November 17, 2012 Leave a comment

WORK

(a short story)

So last night I watch this movie, “Into The Wild”, about this young guy who leaves everything behind and heads to Alaska. I sit back in my chair and I cry. I was headed in that same direction in 1972.

In those days, I left my dorm room at Moody Bible Institute one night and walked home. I just kept walking. I walked fifteen miles. I walked from the Des Plaines EL station to Addison, fifteen miles. My mother cried that night. The school called my father. He called his friends. I show up at the house at 10:30 pm. I hugged my mother and I went to bed.

So the next day, my father makes me scrambled eggs and then he drives me back to Moody. I talk to twenty people. I talk to the men’s assistant dean of students and he tells me that men have cycles like women do. I listen but my head is in Alaska. He asks me if I want a new roommate. I say, “Yes. I don’t want to room with someone named Tim.” I tell him that my first year roommate was Tim from Indianapolis. My second year roommate was Tim from Pennsylvania. The school gives me a new roommate. His name is Steve. We become good friends, in fact, great friends. One Friday night, in my dorm room, I get a call from the men’s assistant dean of students. He tells me that Steve was killed in a car accident on the way to his wedding rehearsal. He fell asleep behind the wheel of his car driving in Kansas. I stay at school to finish the semester and then I leave and I don’t come back.

Three months later my dad comes in my room and wakes me up. He says, “You gotta get up. You can’t sleep anymore. You gotta work. You gotta find a job.” So I get dressed, eat scrambled eggs and I walk to the industrial section of Addison. In the industrial park I look for signs in the front yards of factories. “Help Wanted. Machine Operator” the sign says. I apply.

Inside the factory a man tells me my job. “Take the plastic pieces that come out of here and then grind them over here.” So I take the plastic pieces and I grind them but my head is in Alaska. I walk away from the job during my coffee break. The man calls my dad and he tells him that I walked away. I go look for another job.

At another factory a man hires me. He tells me that I will operate a plastic extruder on the second shift. I say “OK” and I show up that night. Someone shows me the end of the extruder. There are strands of hot plastic coming out of the extruder’s die. The strands are pulled under water to cool and then a blower dries them off. Then, the strands are chopped into pellets. The man tells me to keep my hands out of the pelletizer. I remember this. My job is to keep the extruder hopper full of regrind, keep the plastic strands in their path and empty the pellets into a box. I do this until the third shift guy appears. He is a tall, lanky black man in a jumpsuit. He is carrying a Yankee Doodle Dandy Hamburger in his hand.

I process plastic for the next six years. I also get married to someone I meet at church. We have two sons. I tell my bride-to-be that I want to live in Alaska. I tell her that I have collected maps and books about how to live in the wild. She tells her mother. Her mother tells her that I am crazy. Her mother wants her grandchildren to be close. We divorce after five years and two sons.  Alaska is on hold until the majority age of minor children.

So I work and I work and I work. I become a designer of plastic machines. I become director of engineering. I become a partner in a manufacturing company and I get married again. I tell my bride-to-be that I want to go to Alaska. She tells her mother. Her mother says that I am crazy. Her mother wants her grandchildren to be close. So, I work and I work and I work. I work night and day as a partner. I make a six figure income. I get a Suburban. I get a company credit card. I have twenty-five people working under me. I work so much that when my wife takes the Suburban on camping trips with the kids she says that she doesn’t know if she wants to come back. I went to work and I came home to an empty house. When she was home and I was home, my wife and I would fight. The way I figured it, she wanted more of what my well-paying job offered her but she wouldn’t stand me at the same time. I worked and worked and I worked until one day I told my partners that I wanted to quit.

So, I left the company I helped to start fourteen years before. I left the partnership and the perks behind. I came home and looked in the paper in the help wanted section. I looked and I looked and I looked but there was nothing. I refinanced our home to pay the bills. After three months my wife tells me, “I want a separation.” I cry.

So, we go to marriage counselors. First we go to a male counselor and then we go to a female counselor and then we go to a male counselor. My wife is convinced that I have something on my mind, that I don’t love her. I don’t mention Alaska. After some counseling, we agree to live to together again. My wife says, “I’ll see how you do.”

So I find a job and I go to work. This time I build electrical control panels. I work and I work and I work but the money is not the same as the partnership money. One day the manager takes me in his office and tells me, “Things are slow. We are downsizing. We are closing this branch. We don’t have any openings in our home office in Janesville, Wisconsin.” I say, “Oh.” I call my wife and we meet at a restaurant because I want to tell her in person what happened. I drink two gin and tonics while I am waiting for her to show up. I look out the window and see her pull up in our rusty family van. She comes in and sees me drinking and she wonders what’s up and I tell her. She asks me what I am going to do and I tell her, “I will look for work.”

So I look in the Help Wanted Ads in the newspaper. No jobs. I file for unemployment. Three months later my wife says she wants a separation. I say, “No.” She says, “Get out or I will force you out.” I leave. I go to a hotel. I get a room and call my kids.

So that night I watch this movie, “Into The Wild”, about this young guy who leaves behind everything and heads to Alaska. I sit back in my hotel chair and I cry. I was headed in that same direction in 1972.

© Sally Paradise, 2010, All Rights Reserved

*****

Hard Sun – Eddie Vedder

Filed under short piece, short story, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Teed Off

July 16, 2012 Leave a comment

Imagine a candidate that seeks to make you utterly dependent on the largesse of government.  Such a candidate goes way beyond promising to maintain our Constitution’s mandates, mandates which provide national security, national sovereignty and transportation networks. The rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness have all been guaranteed in writing but, as we have increasingly seen, Obama the Candidate wants the pursuit part to be paid for out of money confiscated from those who have earned the money.  In other words, Obama is telling people you don’t have to do anything to receive what he is offering. You just show up with a ticket (your vote) to play and then its lotto time.

 If you’ve seen the “Julia” video (see my previous post) then you already know that Obama’s campaign promise is for government to be involved in every aspect of your life:  from what you do in the bedroom (contraception and abortion) to your diet to your fuel to your health care to education to retirement.  Cradle-to-grave you will be at the mercy of what government deems good for you.  Imagine the intrusive TSA on steroids.  Imagine waiting in line at a DMV for your privileges to be dispensed by a government worker. This is what Obama and the main stream media are campaigning for. Do you hear me?

 Now imagine a campaign that seeks to divide a nation along racial and income lines, and along a state’s sovereignty right and immigration lines, a campaign that uses the main stream media to daily infect the nation with discord and discontent?

 Obama is the direct opposite of Abraham Lincoln – keenly divisve Obama is intent on reshackling you to the likes of slave-owning fiefdoms circa pre-Civil War South.  He will do this by using government programs with czars but the effect will be the same.

 According to Obama’s political ideology, his characterization of you is that you are too stupid to carry on with your day-to-day life without government intervention.  He wants you to want government.  How odd, shortsighted and how hopeless this vision is for the American people. He wants you to go “Forward” down the aisle placing your hope and trust in him and government. He wants to hear your supplicant “Amen” loud and clear.

 Obama and progressives envy Europe. They want America to emulate a socialist-democracy like Sweden.  Yet, the economies of scale are vastly different between America and Sweden. It would be better if a person of such persuasion would move to Sweden in order to make their utopian dreams come true.  That is until the country’s money runs out. Greece. Spain. Portugal.  The European financial dominos are falling and falling fast and hard. If re-elected Obama would bring that type of ruin to America. He is in denial about the financial implications of endless open-ended government as are the heads of these European countries

Obama plays both ends against the middle:  he lambastes Wall St. money makers will taking contributions from them. He baits Hollywood and homosexuals to gain votes and campaign monies while courting the black vote even though most blacks do not endorse homosexuality. Middle class values don’t matter to Obama. He has a higher vision for them – “Trust me.”

 Obama discounts free enterprise most notably because it is not government.  And his version of government is an organized community centered on him.  Having had no experience with the free enterprise system whatsoever, Obama will still use capitalism as another weapon in his radical bag of tricks. It is common knowledge that people generally dislike, fear and perhaps hate what they do not know. Obama love-hates capitalism.  Capitalism pays for his campaign but capitalism is too free-wheeling for Obama. Capitalism doesn’t need Obama so Obama ebraces government. Government loves it some Obama.

 Obama’s book Dreams of My Father discloses his hatred of colonialism.  Even though colonialism is non-issue in the world today Obama conflates free market enterprise expansion with colonialism.  The fact that free market enterprises create jobs, choices and wealth in poor nations is lost on Obama. His anti-colonialism bent, formed in childhood, has stunted his growth, obscuring any other view of the free market.  Obama doesn’t want business competing with government.  Obama wants government to be a monopoly.

Imagine a President who is decidedly punitive towards those who make money, to those who create jobs, wealth and, of course, generate tax revenue along with all the good they do.  Business is under attack by a two-bit President.  People who do not have two nickels to rub together need businesses and jobs.  But Obama is determined to undermine any free market option through imposing regulations and by doing nothing otherwise.

 Imagine a President who would rather send our troops into harm’s way by sending them to the Strait of Hormuz to protect oil supplies instead of tapping into the wealth of carbon fuels readily available right here at home. Obama is against the north-south oil pipeline and off-shore drilling.  Renewable energy programs such as solar and wind power generate a minute supply of energy to this nation. I know. I work in the industry.  This president doesn’t have a clue about energy. He just knows that “green” is popular at the moment so he panders to the little “green” people most of whom are alien to common sense solutions.

 Now imagine a candidate that has no record of positive accomplishment whatsoever.  He has, though, created the biggest tax increase in history, Obamacare! Any pot smoking dead-head could have done that.  Considering the relative financial backing of each candidate Mitt Romney has done more in a year to create jobs (and tax revenue along with the jobs) as a private citizen than Obama has in almost four years as POTUS.

 Imagine a campaign that has no sense of history, a campaign ready and eager to repeat socialism’s blatant disasters, disasters both historic and current, simply because there is no risk to Obama or the Democrats.  It is not their money on the line.

 If you are clueless don’t vote for Obama. If you are in denial don’t vote for Obama. If you are desperate don’t vote Obama. If you are undecided don’t vote Obama. If you do, then hold out your wrists.  Your master has shackles with your name on them.

Do you really want your wagon shackled to this?:

http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/07/okay-mr-president-we-can-talk-about-the-past/

 OBTW:  In between golf games and campaigning you will find Obama working hard at what he does best:  selling the American people into slavery so he can buy another round of office.

Update:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=XLSEFQ9Vxzc

Filed under 2012 election, commentary, Life As I See It, Political Commentary, Politics, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Fear and Loathing in America

July 1, 2012 Leave a comment

I know, I know, I am polemical.  I polarize people with my words.  I piss people off because I am ever seeking to destroy pretense.  And yet at this juncture in my life I understand this irksome gift as a God-given trait that must be used.  This does not mean that I am perfect, of course, or exempt.  It does mean though that just like the prophets recorded in the Old Testament I cannot remain silent. I am will ever be forthright and forth telling…

 *****

Pervasive throughout our land is the avoidance of asking the hard questions.  We shun the real questions about life and death, about God, about good and evil, about the body and soul, about reason and revelation and about eternity and time. 

 Yesterday I happened to watch The Lord of the Rings (LTR):  The Return of the King.  Putting the above statement into LTR terms, we want to live peaceably in the shire with never having to venture out and deal with the Ring which has consequential power over us. We may say to ourselves, “Why destroy the ring when we can pretend it doesn’t exist? We may have doubts that all that the shire presents to us is all there is to life but we will ignore those doubts in order to avoid conflict and to live peaceably. We choose the immediate surroundings to avoid the dangerous quest that truth demands. We fear what it might take to make the journey.  We fear we will lose ourselves on the way and never return to the shire. We fear what it might take to fight the good fight.

 We fear conflict. Conflict is the evil we most want to avoid.  Our “dialectics” begin with opposites and end in synthesis.  We seek conflict resolution, bargaining, harmony and therapy, no-fault divorce, etc.  Because of this we find it easier to believe nothing of import so that we do not have to fear disagreement, ostracism or even death for what one believes. And because we do not believe in anything then we cannot be responsible for outcomes.

 To choose to believe nothing means that absolute truth is discharged from our lives.  Its voice is no longer heeded.  In fact its voice is now being drowned out.  The commotion that you hear daily is man’s raucous resistance to leaving the shire ~ his tweeting and texting of empty words, the ever streaming pop/rock music filling the void, the Surround sound of ubiquitous blaring entertainment.  It is as if men and women were walking around in the dark calling out to each other and never finding the light switch. They have chosen to stay in the purgatory of their fears.

 The avoidance of pain and conflict has become our primary goal in life.  This is seen in the young voter’s desire for Obamacare.  The health care reform is seen by them as in line with their “values”.  The reform is also seen as providing a sense of self-esteem in that it affirms the young voters wish to avoid pain and insecurity at all costs. On the surface Obamacare appears to provide security for themselves and for others while in truth it is a compromise of what is good and what is evil – the good being the desire for your well-being and the well-being of others and the evil which is the lie that Obama and the government will somehow provide self-esteem and security for you and others and do it with altruism. Remember, God has now been replaced by social science, social science based on rationalism and egalitarianism (think John Rawls, Laurence Tribe, etc.) all under the banner of “Social Justice.”  Rationalism’s,’ “Social Justice” trumps God every time.  Social science is now becoming the creator of society’s values, e.g., God is not to be talked about in public but homosexuality must be.  All of this in spite of the fact that rationalism without revelation could never create value. As Benedict XVI said in 1969:

“What is essential is that reason shut in on itself does not remain reasonable or rational, just as the state that aims at being perfect becomes tyrannical. Reason needs revelation in order to be able to be effective as reason.”

 The avoidance of truth with its inherent conflicts with other than the truth affects our relationships, our sexuality, our creativity, our culture. In place of absolute truth Americans, as mentioned, have latched on to “values.” And our new “value” system has a new way of talking:  “lifestyle”, “Be Yourself;” “Be original;” “Let go and be;”  diversity;” “I have my rights.” But now “rights” are no longer the natural inalienable God-given rights “of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”  Now “rights” have morphed into feelings worn on our sleeve.  We demand that others accept what we feel and that others be open and tolerant. This is what we value above all else. Right and wrong (and love (read not sex)) no longer have a place in our psyche. “Values” – a synthesis of good and evil dominates our diseased culture. And when we ignore serious questions we create words with synthetic meanings to describe our lives.

 “Charisma” is one of those words often heard today. Charisma was once considered a God-given grace but has been used as cover for the “banality of evil” as Hannah Arendt, political philosopher, notes when talking about Hitler’s appeal.

  Allan Bloom, another political philosopher, notes in his 1987 book The Closing of the American Mind:  How Higher Education Has failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today’s Students, “Charisma both justifies leaders and excuses followers.  The very word gives a positive twist to rabble-rousing qualities and activities treated as negative in our constitutional tradition.  And it s vagueness makes it a tool for frauds and advertising men adept at manipulating images.” Consider that both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama have both been called charismatic leaders.

 In the introduction to his book, Bloom writes about what he sees in the classrooms of higher education: 

“There is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of:  almost every student entering the university believes, or says he believes that truth is relative….They are unified only in their relativism and their allegiance to equality….They have been equipped with this framework early on, and it is the modern replacement for the inalienable rights that used to be the traditional American grounds for a free society…The danger they have been taught to fear from absolutism is not error but intolerance.  Relativism is necessary to openness; and this is virtue, the only virtue, which all primary education for more than fifty years has dedicated itself to inculcating.  Openness ~ and the relativism that makes it only plausible stance in the face of various claims to truth and various ways of life and kinds of human beings ~ is the great insight of our times. The true believer is the real danger.  The study of history and culture teaches that all the world was mad in the past; men always thought they were right, and that led to wars, persecutions, slavery, xenophobia, racism, and chauvinism.  The point (now) is not to correct the mistakes and really be right; rather it is not to think you are right at all.”  (emphasis mine)

  In a later chapter titled The German Connection, Bloom relates how Nietzsche, Heidegger, Hegel, Weber, Freud have influenced American thinking.  Americans, within a “pro-choice” democracy, have assimilated this German thinking sometimes turning it on its head.   Bloom writes, 

“…there is now an entirely new language of good and evil, originating in an attempt to get “beyond good and evil” and preventing us from talking with any conviction about good and evil anymore.  Even those who deplore our current moral condition do so in the very language that exemplifies that condition.”

“The new language is that of value relativism and it constitutes a change in our view of things moral and political as great as the one that took place when Christianity replaced Greek and Roman paganism.”

…

“Value relativism can be taken to be a great release from the perpetual tyranny of good and evil, with its cargo and shame and guilt, and the endless efforts that the pursuit of the one and the avoidance of the other enjoin. Intractable good and evil cause infinite distress – like war and sexual repression – which is almost instantly relieved when more flexible values are introduced.  One need not feel bad about or uncomfortable with oneself when just a little value adjustment is necessary.  And this longing to shuck off constraints and have one peaceful, happy world is the first of the affinities between our real American world and that of German philosophy in its most advanced form, given expression by the critics of the President’s speech.”

 Here Bloom is referring to the clamor arising when President Reagan referred to the Soviet Union as the “evil empire.”  When yet at another time Reagan said that the Soviets had “different values,” this statement was met “at worst with silence and frequently with approval,” thus revealing our loathing of absolutism in the former statement.

 At the beginning of the chapter Values, Bloom, relates, “We have come back to the point where we began (in the book), where values take the place of good and evil.” (emphasis mine)

And so like Gollum we place the utmost value on the ring of power, becoming blind to its tyranny over us. Along with the ring we call our values “My Precious.”  Under the yolk of temporal “values” and without facing the serious questions of life we lose ourselves, we lose the real.  We lose love, romance, culture, art ~ everything meaningful to us.

 Love or charity, a virtue which must be constantly worked at, is replaced with easy sex. Consider that in our culture sexual activity is not to be repressed or disciplined but rather it is to be given preeminent unrestrained “value.” Think Sandra Fluke and contraception. Think in-your-face homosexuality. Does America “confirm her soul in self-control” or not?

 Romance, apart from truth is portrayed in movie after movie as just a response to nihilism. Nowhere to be found is the expectation, the unrequited desire and the hoped-for revelation of real romance. Without absolutes there can be no true romance.

 We are a culture that seeks therapeutic counseling.  Yet modern psychology, the sworn enemy of shame and guilt, refuses to talk about good and evil and therefore offers nothing for the soul. Freudian psychology only brings the patient back to repressed sex.

 Modern art has nothing of consequence to offer. Consider the pop art of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein.

 Deafening music, pop or rock, pummels our ear drums daily evoking barbaric passions and depriving the soul of its senses.

 Tattoos deface our bodies so as to reveal our disdain for the discipline that purity of mind and body requires. Inking is given the (non-)value of counter-culture and rabble-rousing.

 Religion, wherein serious questions are faced, is being replaced by positive thinking as preached from the temples of TV.

 In view of the fact that our nation is becoming increasingly devoid  of absolutes and truth while at the same time becoming  increasingly laced with relativism and sliding scale “values” consider this:

 Jesus, the Son of the Living God, says, “You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free.” Free from what? Free from fear.  All fear:  the fear of the unknown, the fear of facing accountability, the fear of death, the fear of loss and personal suffering, the fear of evil.  Jesus’ perfect love casts out all fear. Because of this we can face the serious questions of life head-on knowing that He loves us, that He stands with us and that He has gone before us through the same difficult places. Seek Him and He will be found.

 Going back to the LTR analogy do you remember how Frodo and Sam and the rest rejoiced that the ring had been destroyed, that their arduous life and death journey had been accomplished? Their courage and resoluteness saved the shire, themselves and Middle Earth even while the others in the shire had no clue as to what was going on.  You and I are about to do the same.

Filed under Christianity, commentary, essay, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , , , , ,

Adventures With Paradise

June 17, 2012 Leave a comment

  

It was supposed to be a quiet evening dinner – just me, myself and I – Epicurious at a local food trough. But, the gods of Saturn had other plans for this mortal this Saturday.

Living alone I typically stay home at night. I make my own dinner and eat by myself, dribbling on clothes I know are predestined for the laundry.  But yesterday, a beautiful sun bathed Saturday, I decided to head out of the house for a meal in early evening.  This restaurant visit would be the first time I would have a dinner meal out in well over two years. Saturday breakfast at the Copper Fox is usually my big meal out.

At the Fox I down a repast big enough to choke a horse – eggs over easy, sausage, potatoes and multi-grain toast all drowned in black coffee. At that point having been sated for the rest of the week I then just eat simple throw-together meals.  But last night was different.  I was twitching to get out of the house.  I wanted to cool my ever-burning jets and pay for someone else to make me a meal. And, my serendipity was showing.

So I gussied up.  With some Ann Taylor hugging my bones and a smacking smudge of lipstick I headed out my apartment door and to my car.  Pulling out of the driveway the sun, heading in the opposite direction, shot a ray of reflected light onto my face from the rear view mirror.  I winced and thought, “This will have to do.  I can’t grow another.” I drove over to the next town.  There I knew I would find some restaurants that still served something beyond over-sized plates of Tex-mex carbohydrates with giant big gulps to wash it all down.

Once downtown I parked my car near the hundred-twenty year old county court-house and began to stroll down the makeshift-quaint First Avenue.  As I had learned this suburban hamlet became historic in one day.  All this happened when the city council decided it was time for their town to clone an Immigrant History.  This is verifiable.  The false histrionics I mean.

I once met the town’s historian (a full-time position in this small town!) at a bar about five years ago. While drinking down his bitters, gin and sweet vermouth he told me the whole spiel – the town wanted to appear folksy so it came up with an embellished history – two actual immigrant families who arrived in America from Sweden and who made their home in this town many years ago would come to define the town’s heritage.  With this little tinge of history the town councilmen whitewashed the town hoping to attract crowds to its festivals, art shows and local businesses. Voila!  A smorgasbord of fantasy folklore was created to charm the out-of-towners.

I was reminded of this as I walked past the town’s ‘historical’ center.  I continued to walk along the brick-paved street past the faux-historical showcase of facades.  Everywhere I looked there were gaggles of doe-eyed arm-in-arm couples taking advantage of the romantic spectacle that is this revisionist-town.

I walked by several restaurants, none of them appealing to my appetite, none of them worthy of my ‘thrill-of-the-moment’ twenty-bucks.

I walked on past the New-Age Gem store and its wafting cloud of incense. I passed Mama’s Gratto, a patio padded with doting couples – men doting their Miller Lites and women doting their chilled chards, both poking at a plate of shared antipasto.

I skimmed past the darkened window of Kwasimodo Sushi. Silhouettes stood out above the counter.  I passed the ever-strumming ever-piped mariachi music of the Mexican restaurant and crossed the street looking both ways for food, my stomach now on high alert.

There it was directly across the street – a new restaurant right on the corner.  An Italian wood-burning oven restaurant.  I walked over to the front door .  The menu was posted on a side window.  Inside the doorway stood a sidewalk sign offering “Special – Baked Oysters.”  This caught my attention.  The last time I had baked oysters was during a New Orleans Madri-Gras week that should never be remembered. ‘Nawlins food though, my palette can never forget, is delectable.  So in a trance-like state I ventured inside hoping to create a little culinary heaven for about one hour. Instead what I received was purgatory, a purgatory inducing purge-atory.

(Did I mention I live alone?  There is a reason for that.  I remain single because of George Bush. I went through a divorce while he was president. This is why I eat alone every night.  This is why I never hear Dream Weaver while I’m showering. This is why I don’t eat my Italian Wedding soup looking at some dreamy-eyed Spaniard whose thirst for life is matched only by his roaring appetite for friends to enable him. And besides this, there aren’t many real men anymore.  I don’t mean macho. I mean real as in solid stainless steel, not Formica veneer.  We have Formica veneer in the White House right now but I live alone because of George Bush.)

As I entered the restaurant I saw a throng of waitresses standing at the end of the bar.  Dressed in black from head to toe the girls were all in their early twenties.  The manager appeared to be giving them their instructions for the evening.  I waited at the door but there was no response from the crew so I sought a small table along a wall. I sat down on the long bench that ran the length of that wall. I sat facing the room.  From there I could see that there were only three patrons in the restaurant, myself and two young women.  A handful of diners were outside on the patio. It was just after five o’clock in the afternoon.

A waitress broke free from the meeting.  She welcomed me as she handed me a menu.  I ordered a Stella. When she came back with the drink I ordered the baked oysters.

I sat in the extremely chilled room and watched the crew scurry around the bar and in and out of the patio door. I wondered if flies would take advantage of the open invite. After a short while an older couple, a grandfather and grandmother, came in with three of their very young grandkids. They were shown a table along the wall, one table away from me. I sipped my cold beer trying to warm up.

Soon a young couple entered the restaurant.  They had brought with them their four daughters.  The daughters looked to be all under the age of ten.  This family was seated right next to me along the wall – the four girls sat on the same bench seat.  I soon learned that the youngest girl did not want to be there. She was adamant in her disapproval.

“Muh-maaaaa.”  Muh-maaaaa.” The youngest one whined repeatedly, “I don’t want to be here.  I don’t want to be here.” as she crawled from the bench to her father and then to her mother and then back to the bench. I was hoping my food would arrive soon.  I was quickly becoming de-romanticized about my evening out.  The Minestrone Moderne had morphed into Kinder-Kare.

With four children of my own, all now grown, I had brought my own kids to a restaurant early in the evening just like these parents had so as to not disturb the other patrons. But that was years ago and I had forgotten about the family hours.

My baked oysters arrived after thirty minutes.  They must have been fresh.  The half-dozen looked just dandy sprinkled with bread crumbs, Asiago cheese and some chopped herbs and shallots.  But as you know oysters are not eaten in the most delicate of ways.  So right then I wanted to be home – alone with the mollusks and far from the madding crowd

After downing the first oyster in the door walks another young couple with kids.  Guess where they were seated.  Yep.  On my left side.

To my left and to my right were antsy children, antsy children all wanting to go home or to go to MacDonald’s for supper.  Both sets of parents and the grandparents eager for a Saturday night on the town ordered wine.  Ah, the memories of wine’s sedative affects amidst the wails of youth’s discontent.

It certainly seemed odd to me that the three families with children were seated alongside me as the whole restaurant lay open.  But then it clicked.  I would naturally sit where parents of young children would sit on an early Saturday night. A lot of wine had passed under the bridge.

I finished my dinner, gulping down oysters five and six as fast I could with swigs of Stella.  When I was through I pushed the plate of disgorged oyster shells forward and almost off the edge of the table. I was hoping to get the waitress’ attention.  No such luck.  It would be another fifteen minutes before she would make her appearance at the kitchen doorway.  By now my stomach and head were both reeling from parenting’s noble strife.

When the waitress finally arrived she asked me if there was anything else I needed. I shook my head “No.”  I didn’t think they would have ear plugs on the desert menu and I didn’t want to ask for a bucket, either.

The check arrived after another curious disappearance.  I pulled out a wad of dollar bills hoping for enough cash so that I didn’t have to wait on her again.  I was in luck.

I set the bill folder down with the cash tucked inside. I looked around for my waitress but she was nowhere to be found again.  I grabbed my purse and headed out the door.  Ah. I heaved a sigh of relief as the warm summer air decompressed my thoughts.

Retracing my steps through Ersatz village I found my car and drove home.  Thinking that my parenthood had lost large quantities of its patience along the way I vowed that I would never go out for dinner again at night when the young and the restless were about. At least not until I become a grandparent and retrace my steps while sipping wine.

© Sally Paradise, 2012, All Rights Reserved

Filed under Life As I See It, Romance, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , ,

You’re the Best Particle of Me

April 19, 2012 Leave a comment

Did you know that Intelligently Designed quantum physics provides matchmaking services? You didn’t?  Well, recently, I read…

”…that in reality two electrons can really fit into the same energy level because they can have opposite spins.  This means that they can both fit into the lowest (symmetric) energy level and, crucially, this level decreases in energy as the atoms get closer together.  This means that it is energetically favorable for two distant atoms to move closer. And this is what happens in nature.”

 And God saw that it was not good for atom to be alone.

 (Two electrons, opposite spins?  The atoms get closer together?  Yin and Yang, Matter and anti-matter. Grace and nature. Male and female. This fundamental symmetry makes sense at the atomic level and also at the nuclear family level.  Hence the mating song “I’ve Got You Under My Spectrascope.”)

 “…This preference for two atoms to stick together as a result of sharing their electrons between them is known as a covalent bond.”…

 And the preference for two humans (Mr. Spin up and Ms. Spin down) to stick together as a result of sharing their lives in the molecule of marriage is known as intimate bonding.

 “…covalent bonding is the reason that you are not a bunch of atoms sloshing around in a featureless blob.”

 This explains a lot about my love life!  I’ve got your atomic number, buddy.

 Matchmaker, Matchmaker make me a match. A little covalence bonding is all I ask.

 The above quotes from Chapter Eight, Interconnected, from:

The Quantum Universe (And Why Anything That Can Happen Does) by Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw, Da Capo Press, copyright 2011

 You should know that…

Covalent bonding is universal:

Filed under Christianity, family, Human Interest, Life As I See It, marriage, non-fiction, Physics, prose, Romance, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Odd Is The Loneliest Number

April 18, 2012 Leave a comment

Odd.  That describes me in a nutshell.

 Flannery O’Connor, the great Catholic writer, was once quoted as saying “You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you odd.”  So be it. I am in good company then.

 Now that I am older and wiser (at least according to the aphorism) I am less jostled by every wind of fashion, less captivated by got-cha type of thinking typical of the penny-ante journalists so in vogue today.  In more ways than one I have let odd take over.

 Some odd thoughts:

 A wise old preacher once told me “If it’s new it ain’t true.  If it’s true it ain’t new.”

 Truth has historical record. Lies, cheap novelty as in “Hope and Change.”

 I agree with Wolcott’s assessment (see James Wolcott’s Vanity Fair article  “Prime Time’s Graduation”)about the state of today’s movies being rather boorish and sophomoric and that television/cable TV is far outpacing movies with its much higher quality of writing and directing and a greater depth of characters. Yet, I despair of any good thing coming out of either.

 Truly, I cannot remember the last time I rented a movie.   I don’t remember the title of the movie, either. I haven’t been to theatre in well over two years.  For what reason I did attend is forgotten.

 TV:  I don’t watch The Living Dead, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, The Real Housewives of Chicago’s North Side or all manner of well-written, well-crafted dramatic episodes or all manner of crime investigations, all manner of (fill-in-the-blank) “finely textured” serial programming that Hollywood cranks out. Though superbly crafted these often prurient programs hold nothing of interest or value to me. I am happily odd without them in my head.

 You can believe me when I say that I don’t care about dead people who hang around unwanted or that Don Draper is losing himself in his work and the next untapped babe or that Walt is a terminally living drug producer and seller (Breaking Bad, like many cable shows in fact outrage me.  That anything like this can of trash is available on TV for kids and adults to view is unthinkably criminal. I’m a mature adult. I don’t care about the show’s supposedly ‘mature themes.”  I think the show is substantive abuse.)

 Look around.  We consume comparison:  commercials, magazines, TV programs, the Shahs of Sunset. I could easily imagine that Obama’s class warfare rhetoric would quickly lose its teleprompter zip if our culture didn’t keep promoting keeping up with the Shahs of Sunset and the like.

 Contentment has been dislodged from the human psyche and has gone missing.  Ubiquitous high-profile bling now holds court.  Disparity is highlighted daily. And, as a result, charity (in the form of higher taxes) is demanded in order to make all things equal.  Somehow, this equates to social justice.

 These days low-income people can dwell on income disparity 24/7.  Many now have big screen TVs and microwaves.  And, before them now on the big hi-def screen are the ostentatious rich:  The Real Housewives of Atlanta.  It would be easy for anyone watching to say “The Grass IS greener…” Envy and covetousness are in your face, especially when the bas-relief is provided by HDTV. 

 Beside this, BHO and other talking heads of the liberal media are telling them that the rich need to do their part. This demand is ludicrous.

With his bully pulpit BHO promotes class warfare.  He tells us that the answer to your problems is to take money from someone else!  Isn’t this the mentality typically found among Chicago street gang members but is now code-named Social Justice?  (BTW:  What we need is not a single payer health care system. What we need is single payer taxpayers where every single person does their part and not just 50 % of the nation. Everyone should be invested in our country.)

 Am I human?  Upon occasion:

I have been known to watch Guy Fieri (I think he’s cute.) on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives hamming it up with restaurant owners. And, sometimes when I’m in a really grisly mood I watch Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations (Anthony, Paula Deen can cook for me anytime, your blackballing of her cooking style notwithstanding). 

 Speaking of food, I don’t own a Blackberry, iPhone or other hand-held electronic device which could bleep in a restaurant and interrupt a Crème brûlée with a dear friend.  This even though I work in a technical industry and could easily finger pointed barbs with the best of them. I am old school.  Pen and paper work well.  Spitballs, too.  And, if the world is going to end I am prepared. I won’t need an iPad telling me that I’m going to be with the Lord – that’s already been documented.

 Without the gizmos I don’t tweet. I don’t send 140 character snippets of pithy self-brined revelation out to chomping-at-the-bit (or byte) followers.  Come to think of it I don’t think I have any followers! (This post has enough characters to choke a gaggle of hand-held devices and their indentured slaves.)

 ‘What does she do?”

I mostly read, talk to myself when no one is around, go to church, dance wildly to the Romantics’ What I Like About You, annoy my family and routinely infuriate people I don’t know on the internet. 

 How odd. But with a name like Sally Paradise how could I not be the odd woman out or the \sqrt{3}.

Filed under biographical, Cinema, Culture, Film, Fun Stuff, Human Interest, Life As I See It, Life story, Non-fiction, prose, Short Piece, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , , , , ,

I Support the Man of Action: Part One

January 9, 2012 Leave a comment

WLS-890 AM, Sunday afternoon:  On my way to the grocery store I turned on the car radio.  Phil Ponce, a Chicago television journalist for WTTW, was filling in for one of his sons, either Anthony or Dan, during their Sunday afternoon radio broadcast. I believe the Ponce Brother’s program was also substituting for Bob Brinker’s Money Talk (a favorite program of mine) that afternoon. As I tuned in Anthony or Dan was mentioning how that most of the callers were favoring Newt Gingrich as the GOP nominee.

 The Ponces, father and son, then took another call, a female caller who mentioned her age of 59.  She talked (I’ll paraphrase) about how the country needs to be taken back. Phil Ponce mentioned that many callers had said the same thing.  He then asked her what she meant by that. In brief she said that many of the laws and the Constitution itself that we as a nation have in place are simply disregarded by the people in power, especially by President Obama and his administration.

 In talking about her childhood she recalled how that we as a nation knew what the laws were and that they were not subject to arbitrary change by those in power as they are now. She said no country is perfect or has it easy but our nation was a light shining on a hill (a Reagan reference) but is now it is dimming in that capacity.

 That is what I heard. Her exact words…if the show’s podcast or transcript becomes available I will post it.

 Also, as I found out later, during the same broadcast and prior to my turning the radio on, Illinois Senator Mark Kirk surprised the Ponces by calling in.  Phil Ponce recounted how he had jokingly suggested that the illinois Senator call in to talk about his choice for a GOP candidate. Senator Kirk did call in and said that he was backing Romney.  This is too bad.

 About two weeks ago I wrote an e-mail to Senator Kirk asking him to back Newt Gingrich.  I did this when I heard that Kirk was coming out for Romney.  Romney, I believe, will be in over his head.  But if Romney becomes the GOP nominee Romney would still be a much better choice than Obama, Obama and his multiple czars who are responsible to no one but the president. 

By bypassing our elected representatives in Congress and appointing these czars Obama showed flagrant disrespect for America, her Constitution and our elected representatives. Also, Obama’s appointment of Eric Holder as AG was meant as a slap in the face of the American system of justice (e.g., Holder’s ignoring the Black Panther’s intimidation of voters).

************* 

I am backing Newt Gingrich for President. 

In a recent web-column for The Detroit News economist Thomas Sowell talks about the need for a man of action to lead this country:

 Many Americans are already saying that they can hardly recognize the country they grew up in. We have already started down the path that has led Western European nations to the brink of financial disaster. … 

While the televised debates are what gave Newt Gingrich’s candidacy a big boost, concrete accomplishments when in office are the real test. Gingrich engineered the first Republican takeover of the House of Representatives in 40 years — followed by the first balanced budget in 40 years. The media called it “the Clinton surplus” but all spending bills start in the House of Representatives, and Gingrich was Speaker of the House.…

In a world where we can make our choices only among the alternatives actually available, the question is whether Newt Gingrich is better than Barack Obama — and better than Mitt Romney.

Romney is a smooth talker, but what did he actually accomplish as governor of Massachusetts, compared to what Gingrich accomplished as Speaker of the House? When you don’t accomplish much, you don’t ruffle many feathers. But is that what we want?

Can you name one important positive thing that Romney accomplished as governor of Massachusetts? Can anyone? Does a candidate who represents the bland leading the bland increase the chances of victory in November 2012? A lot of candidates like that have lost, from Thomas E. Dewey to John McCain.

Illinois must vote for Newt in the Illinois primary on March 24, 2012.  We need a man of action who has a sincere appreciation of American history, the Constitution, American values and actual success with the political process.  I encourage you to vote for the Statesman Newt Gingrich to be the GOP nominee for president. Let’s stop the pious baloney.

Filed under Life As I See It, Political Commentary, Politics, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , ,

Enter In His Gates

December 31, 2011 Leave a comment

The other day I walked as usual during my lunch hour. Working in a downtown Chicago office affords many interesting paths for my walking and praying. That day I chose Millenium Park, thankful for some open space and towering blue sky.

 Walking and praying are complimentary actions for me. They are complimentary in that praying to advance the Kingdom of God is coupled to my physical action of going forward, of not being static or complacent. Walking increases my heart rate, my breathing also becomes faster and deeper.  As I walk every breath then becomes a prayer uttered out of the rhythm of my heart, mind, body and soul. Beyond this, walking and praying are often the only actions I can take when I am told to wait on the Lord.

 That day, walking and praying, I lifted up the needs of others and my own very pressing needs. As I did so I clearly heard these words from the Holy Spirit:

 “Enter in His gates with Thanksgiving

And into His courts with praise.”

 In that moment I understood that God was acknowledging my intercessions and supplications. I felt a child-like pleasure in His notice of me. God was calling me into his presence.

 In a sermon by C.S. Lewis written down in a book by the same name, The Weight of Glory, this moment was captured for me:

 “For glory means a good report with God, acceptance by God, response, acknowledgement, and welcome into the heart of things. The door on which we have been knocking all our lives will open at last.

Perhaps it seems rather crude to describe glory as the fact of being “noticed” by God. But this is almost the language of the New Testament.  St. Paul promises to those who love God not, as we should expect, that they will know Him, but that they will be known by Him. (1 Cor. 8:3).”

 That day, not only was God acknowledging my words but His invitation to “Enter in His courts…” revealed that He wanted the object of His love, me, to be in His presence. My giving God praise and thanksgiving would realign my objectivity so that one day I would be in position to know the pleasure of the inferior in His words to me: “Well done thou good and faithful servant.”

 “Apparently”, as C.S. Lewis also wrote in Weight, “what I had mistaken for humility had, all these years prevented me from understanding what is in fact the humblest, the most childlike, the most creaturely of pleasures-nay, the specific pleasure of the inferior: a beast before men, a child before its father, a pupil before his teacher, a creature before its Creator.”

 Lewis, again in the same book, also wrote that “Glory, as Christianity teaches me to hope for it, turns out to satisfy my original desire (the specific desire of the inferior) and indeed to reveal an element in that desire which I had not noticed. By ceasing for a moment to consider my own wants I have begun to learn better what I really wanted.”

 A New Year is upon us. I will cross the threshold of this New Year and “Enter in His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise.” I do so as an adopted child anxious to drink joy from the fountains of joy.

 

Filed under Christian character, Christianity, Life As I See It, New Year's Eve, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , , , , ,

Course Correction Needed: 2012

December 26, 2011 4 Comments

Currently, we as a nation have as our leader the only un-American President ever to hold the office.  He is un-American not because he is black or because there have been questions about his place of birth.  He is un-American precisely because he wants to transform America into a completely different country ~ effectively, an EU style nation under centralized control. And as such the liberty of the individual will convert to the power of the state and its elite contingent.

Here is what a member of Britain’s Parliament said in a recent book warning Americans about the Europeanization of America:

The alarming thing is that President Obama, the former chair of the Senates’s Europe Committee, seems genuinely to believe that the United States can usefully learn from the European political and social model.  The platform on which he was elected, and the policies he is now implementing, are not a series of initiatives lashed randomly together.  They amount to a sustained project of Europeanization:  state health care, government day care, universal college education, carbon taxes, support for supra-nationalism, bigger government, a softer national policy.

 Of course European leaders are flattered by the mimicry.  But, in their hearts, even they know that pursuing such an agenda leaves a country less prosperous and less free.[1]

In order to accomplish this change Obama regularly uses blatant demagogic rhetoric of the class warfare type to stir up fears.  And, with a sliding scale of European-like moral relativism coupled with the Left’s anthropocentric humanism, he ultimately promotes the worship of man and his material needs – One nation under man and his “fair share” of material goods.

With all the arrogance he can muster and an uncontrained vision of top-down government Obama truly seeks to unsettle Americans from their long-standing moral and religious heritage and move them into the framework of a secular democracy based on nothing more than rational humanism and anthropocentrism. He plays to the fear of inequitable outcomes (materialism) and encourages envy cleverly disguised as egalitarianism.  But consider these telling words from economist Thomas Sowell:

 “Those who want to take our money and gain power over us have discovered the magic formula:  get us envious or angry at others and we will surrender, in installments, not only our money but our freedom.  The most successful dictators of the 20th century ~ Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Mao – all used this formula, and now class warfare politicians are doing the same.”

  “Envy plus rhetoric equals “social justice.”

Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it. (emphasis mine)

 Nor is economic failure the worst of it.  The millions slaughtered by Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot for political reasons are an even grimmer reality.

Obama daily brines us with acerbic fairness talk hoping to stir up a maelstrom of unrest and radicalism, hoping to push the U.S. into a European model of government where the rule of “Fairness” and “Rights” replaces Truth and Love.  In this madness Obama is helped by the influence of the European George Soros, his money being channeled into progressive media outlets.

Obama dislikes the U.S. because he envies Europe.  He does not want to exalt America’s exceptionlism and its unmatched charity.  Rather, he wants to extol Europe’s elitism and its useless intellectual humanitariansim.  He believes Europe to be superior to America in many ways including societal issues and in the nature of its governance.  He certainly believes Europe to be on the height of societal evolution when in fact Europe is cutting off its own moral foundations at the root.

As a student of radical SDS terrorist Bill Ayers Obama also bows to the 60’s radical’s vision of democratic revolution, but he does so now in a new button-downed guise of “Hope and Change.”  (BTW:  the phrase “separation of church and state” does not appear in the Constitution. The phrase was coined by Bill Ayers in 1975.)

Since the 1960s when the radicalization of democracy began it has continued to undermine all authoritative institutions and even Truth itself. The 60’s radical prostrates himself before pure autonomy and consent, offering nothing of value in exchange. Beyond all this Obama wants to place over America the banner of “One World” ~ “One World Under Man and Materialism

Under such a “One-World” banner Obama would pledge U.S. allegiance to international energy, environmental, economic, judicial and social policies. This banner would replace our own hard won historically, philosophically and religiously birthed constitution with an Eric Holder type of pick and choose demagoguery – a tyranny of the unconstrained vision to which Obama, Holder and Europe fully embrace. It is a banner of an abstracted democracy which encourages people to abandon self-governance and the idea of Truth. Under such a banner “The pressure builds to defer to elite opinion, to the requirements of humanitarianism and egalitarianism, to the moral authority of international law.”[2]

Not just because of the ineptness of his leadership, his lack of statesmanship, his neglect of history, his political cronyism, his scorn of facts or his faux spirituality should Obama be a one term president.  If  Obama were to be elected again America would lose its heart, mind and soul to the nihilism, secularism and parasitism of socialism so characteristic of the European nations today ~ nations floundering under the weight of their own foolishness, lack of self-governance and spiritual neglect.

America needs an American President. We need a president who will guide us, a republic established by spiritual and philosophic men and women of great insight, of great learning and of great depth of character.  The founders were people of self-governance committed to the best possible outcomes available to every man.  What we have now is a one-dimensional populist autobiographer whose main devotions are to himself and to golf.

“Barack Obama also is the deep thinker who ponders great things.  And the thing that Barack Obama seems to ponder most is his own greatness.  He doesn’t write biographies, he writes only autobiographies.  He gives speeches which he declares to be historic.  He recognizes his place in history long before he has created history.  This nation is but a stage upon which Barack Obama creates his life story, and it’s all about him.” William A. Jacobson,  A Harvard Trial Lawyer for McCain

America does not need the snarkiness and hubris of light-weight Obama. We certainly do not want or need a president who cut his ideological “teeth” on the teachings of people like 60s radical Bill Ayers and “God Damn America” Jeremiah Wright. We do not need a freshman senator from Illinois to vote “Present” during our times of national crisis.

The pilgrims left Europe in order to embrace freedom of religion ~ a freedom from a centralized religion. In the process they, along with Truth-honoring statesmen helped to form an American Republic derivative of and dependent on Truth.  Obama’s presidency is now piloting our ship away from the shores of vested Truth and back towards Europe. There the vacuum of moral relativism with its detestation of Truth will suck the U.S. down into its sink-hole.

God Save America from Obama.

[1] Daniel Hannan, The New Road to Serfdom: A letter of Warning to America (New York:  Broadside Books, 2010), 76

[2]  Daniel J. Mahoney, The Conservative Foundations of a Liberal Order  (ISI Books, 2010) 21

Filed under 2012 election, essay, Life As I See It, Political Commentary, Politics, short piece, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , ,

← Older posts