Reflections

Again, after some time, I am able to put a few thoughts, reflections, onto my blog. I don't flatter myself that anyone reads this. But I would be remiss if I failed to make available the truth as it is made known to me.
Being a prophet can be a lonely task. An additional burden is my caring for Mother. She sleeps more and more, eats less and less. I am determined she will remain here and die at home, but this makes my life sad. I rejoice that the Lord gives me the strength, and, while I am confused that George does not call Mother hardly at all, this choice is mine. I cannot answer for his conscience. I must make myself content that Mark is as faithful as he is and shares the burden as often as he is able. The Lord has been very good, very faithful to me. I do not deserve this love. I don't know what I will do when Mother enters the Nearer Presence. But, as HE has answered my need each time I have called Him, I know HE will do what is necessary when that arises, too.
We live in terrible and sad times. Even trying to put a good spin on daily news, one must confess that there can be no good out-come of the events in which we find ourselves embroiled.
What angers me most, I suppose, is that most of the commentators or instigators of the tragic events, the war, the growing poverty, the devastation of the environment (and by extension, our health) are utterly oblivious of the cost which will be exacted. The worse ramification is that these wicked men who promote war, poverty, ill-health and the like are not asked to pay any price for their decisions. Indeed, thanks to the Bush nightmare, they are given tax-breaks to the tune of many millions.
God will judge, and on that I rely. There! I have said it! If they were compelled to stand in the front-lines of their war-machine, they might make vastly different choices and decisions. Whether they survive is of little interest to me, as the survival of the good military sent to accomplish their desires on Iraq, Afghanistan and Heaven only knows where else is of little interest to them.
I know this coldness is out of place in one called to serve the Ancient of Days. I do honestly try to turn this away from me. I know how badly this sludges up my prayer-life and spiritual state. The first rule in spirituality, though, is to be honest. When we are honest, at least then the Holy Ghost can begin to repair the damage, excise the sin.
It would be nice to place the blame on the greedy, cruel and egocentric politicians who have mucked up our lives and our world. On balance, though, I need to be honest and recognize that all the devastation these creatures of evil wreak on the world can enter into my sphere ONLY if I allow it. The choice is mine.
That old bugaboo of free will (rejected by the evangelicals in the White House and elsewhere) - either I embrace it and choose to move into a Godly life, or I reject it, placing blame everywhere except where it ought to be placed, which is squarely in the choices and directions I elect. As the Quakers of old and even many of recent memory, Thomas Kelly and Rufus Jones in particular, have taught me, the immanence of the God of Creation, the God of history, the God Who enters into History as a Man in the Flesh of Jesus of Nazareth, this God is omnipresent. If we look, we can see Him in the dew on the grass, we will know Him in those with whom we share a meal (the breaking of the bread!), we can find Him in the promise of each day, even in each breath.
How we miss this is due to the terrible misfortune of our confusing the stuff of our world (and our acquisition of it) to be more important than HOW we live in the world.
The Quaker principle of simplicity is to help us see the Hand of the Lord through the draperies of Creation.
Regarding the nuisance of politicians and how they throw up smoke screens to keep us off-balance, how they have betrayed all Americans, except those who have so clearly benefited from these outrages, the unhappy result is evident. The mess more and more confuses Christians with the delusions of the prince of this world. Yet the Christian must more and more struggle to confront and address the inequities and the hubris which has so corrupted politics these days.
Failure to confront the evil of the day is failure to take up our Cross, which is the dictum of Jesus. We cannot have it both ways. Quakers understand this clearly.
The Gospel sets us a challenge - either we follow the Via Crucis or we are faithless.
One of those hard statements of Jesus which puts a strong light on our choices is found in Luke 9:62 in which Jesus says those who first choose to follow Him, then turn away and look back (does He mean regrets the choice, the cost of being a follower?) are not worthy of the Kingdom.
This statement and Matthew 25:31 and so forth, cause me no end of self-examination and concern.
Indeed, I am ashamed that I am made so angry, sometimes I think my head will explode! when I consider many of the decisions made by "our government." They spy on the citizens. They have tortured, and may still do so, in our name. Do we grow angry? No. We find some weak justification for their betrayal in comforting ourselves that it will make us safer. Really? One must ask, who is the greater threat?
Frankly, I am not convinced by such specious argument.
Because I DO remember the history of our nation, I recall that the very abuses we now endure were amongst the causes for the Revolution in 1776.
Certainly I do not advocate a bloody revolution, but I cannot be so hypocritical as to say that nothing must change. Too much is wrong, grossly wrong and we must alter it now, or we will swelter under these burdens for long generations.
The Gospels themselves almost demand we stand up in non-violent protest, that we follow the example of Jesus and the Fathers of the Church. Time and again, I am brought up short as I read the Magnificat in Luke 1:46-55. The patent evidence of this hymn is that the Lord is entering into the world of men to change the order of business, to reorganize our priorities. He comes to cast down the rich, to pull down the powerful, to make safe and exalt the poor. He comes to feed the hungry, to bind up wounds, to restore vision to the blind and hearing to the deaf, to defend the widow and orphan, to raise the dead.
The Gospel is a strong document for social action built on moral and ethical framework.
If we do not exercise our Christian Faith, it will grow moribund and die. We see how that has happened to too many pseudo-Christians, the president and many others in his circle. Through their betrayal of the true Faith, and the encouragement of many false prophets, the entire nation is put into a compromised moral state.
Too many Christians are undiscerning, poorly informed in Gospel matters and are not led of the Spirit.
The unhappy truth about government is that if they do not understand, from the beginning, that they cannot abuse the people, they will inflict any abuses, maintain any status quo, pushing the fraudulent rationale that so they will maintain peace. Rubbish to that!
It behooves the people of the United States to rise up in non-violent but intractable protest against the present abusive, deceptive and ignoble administration.
We have suffered quite enough at the hands of these petty despots. We, the People of this Republic have the power and the right to change an unresponsive and immoral government. The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution both give us the reason for healthy change and the means of healthy change.
This option must be utilized before more harm is done, not only to this nation, but those whom we have put in harm's way.
What Bush has perpetrated upon the Iraqi, Afghani (and now Pakistani?) people is unconscionable and must be stopped. The specious argument that we are fighting "terrorists" is tissue-thin and will not hold water. If similar schemes are put forward for an attack upon Iran, if the generality of this nation think that is an acceptable course of action, AND if we do not demand Bush's impeachment, then we ought to demand he be first in the front lines. After all, he is so proud of being "Commander-in-Chief" let him be a Commander. Compel him, craven that he is, to put his own life on the line, instead of the lives of other mother's sons and daughters. In the final analysis, he, Cheney, Rice, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld, who have so cavalierly jeopardized and murdered trusting young American lives (not to mention how many utterly innocent Iraqis, Afghanis, Pakistanis), may be shot at as easily as any others.
It is my humble conviction that those who wish to start and pursue wars ought to be the first ones out of the gate in the fighting of them. It is inexcusable that old men and women in Congress and the White House elect to send other people's children off to fight in battles for causes they themselves are unwilling to die for.
The first question we must raise about any "act of war" is whether the initiator is willing to lead the troops into the field of battle. If he is not, then we may consider the "cause" a fraud which puts the lie to any fuss about the worthiness of the cause.
While I am adamantly and unalterably opposed to the use of violence, it does seem justice that those who declare wars, must first be willing to strap on a flak-vest and fight in the thing.