Day: February 19, 2020

20200219: MAGA/KAG Rally Thread, Phoenix AZ.

Three MAGA rallies this week? You guys ready to roll? Gas up the bus, and make some snacks. We’re headed out west to protect the 2016 map of wins and expand upon them. But there is MOAR going on than just the MAGA rallies, and we need to understand the schedule to all be on the same page. Rallies are highlighted in bold. Let’s try to keep up with our President.

  • President leaves Tuesday for a fundraiser in Rancho Mirage, California at Larry Ellison’s house. It’s a big deal. Expected to raise about 10 million dollars.
  • Phoenix, AZ Wed, February 19, 2020 07:00 pm (MST)
  • President flies back to Vegas to spend the night.
  • Thursday Morning, President attends Graduation Ceremony for Prisoners in Vegas, signature program. If he can actually reduce the recidivism rate, it would be a major accomplishment.
  • President flies to Colorado Springs for rally.
  • Colorado Springs, CO Thu, February 20, 2020 05:00 pm (MST)
  • President flies back to Vegas to spend the night.
  • Las Vegas, NV Fri, February 21, 2020 12:00 pm (PST)
  • VP Pence gives a rally in Reno, 1:15pm.
  • Fly back to DC or to Mar-A-Lago? Is Baron on spring break? Melania did not come back to the WH with President after the Daytona 500. Maybe they are still in Florida? No….. if you thought we were done, you were WRONG.
  • After speaking at three rallies in three days in three states, with attending a California fundraiser and Las Vegas graduation speech, Trump will have one day to rest up before he heads to India for a two-day visit with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. (and Melania is going to India with him)

Each rally the President has includes data for about 25% of attendees WHO ARE Dem! In New Hampshire, we gained data on 17% of those who didn’t even vote in 2016 (17% of 70K who registered is enough to swing an election in New Hampshire). Besides, it’s good to have a Presidential rally in the Dems back yard……. it demoralizes the political opposition’s campaign staff. A MAGA rally is impossible to ignore and counteracts the local press gained by the Dems.

Traveling and campaigning will make our President stronger. He does love to be outside of DC, in the middle of America, where the beauty of the land is inescapable and humbles a simple man.

Let’s get oriented with a map of Arizona. This should help those of us east of the Mississippi.

It’s also important to understand the geography of AZ as mother nature provides her own photographic regions.

According to Wiki: “Phoenix is the capital and most populous city in Arizona, with 1,660,272 people (as of 2018). It is also the fifth most populous city in the United States” The metro area is…. ” 11th largest by population in the United States, with approximately 4.73 million people as of 2017.[7] ” I had no idea Phoenix was so big. Did you?

Continuing from Wiki: Phoenix was settled in 1867 as an agricultural community near the confluence of the Salt and Gila Rivers and was incorporated as a city in 1881. It became the capital of Arizona Territory in 1889.[9] It is in the northeastern reaches of the Sonoran Desert and has a hot desert climate.[10][11] Despite this, its canal system led to a thriving farming community with the original settler’s crops remaining important parts of the Phoenix economy for decades, such as alfalfa, cotton, citrus, and hay.[12][13] Cotton, cattle, citrus, climate, and copper were known locally as the “Five C’s” anchoring Phoenix’s economy. These remained the driving forces of the city until after World War II, when high-tech companies began to move into the valley and air conditioning made Phoenix’s hot summers more bearable.[14]

Of course, President Trump has been to Phoenix to campaign in the past. After all, this is Maricopa County…. home to Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

These early rallies are also a strategic move to line the campaign coffers for Senators and House seats in 2020. The extra dollars allow campaigns to book TV time earlier and at cheaper rates, and plan long term for the final push of October. Let’s give Trump a little boost, and if you can, make the $3-10 donations for select Senate/House seats. We need to be smart with our donations this year. For example, $100 spread among the Repub candidates who are running against the “Dirty 30” will help to flip the House back to our control. Plus, Repubs have far more Senators running than the Dems and we know the Dems are targeting the Senate. We must protect the Senate for judges and treaties. Expect the focus of the AZ rally to be on Martha McSally and keeping AZ a red state for 2020.

Remember when we were rather indifferent on Martha McSally? And then, in the midst of ShaMMMpeachment, she called Manu Raju of CNN “You’re a liberal hack” and refused to answer his questions? We nodded, slowly, …… new found respect for McSally. The media had a meltdown. The press corps demanded she apologize….. as if a US Senator is obligated to answer questions on the time schedule for CNN…….. McSally refused to apologize, stood defiant……… and her campaign sold t-shirts. Frankly, if McSally ran on a platform admonishing the MSM, she would probably win in a landslide.

Students for Trump are ready in AZ and have more college chapters than Bernie/AOC across the country. They had a BIG turnout for their 2nd Amendment rally and work all year long registering people to vote. Great young people and give us hope for the future.

Of course, if we think of Phoenix, we think of Glen Campbell’s lost love.

If you’re in Phoenix, check out Rusconi’s American Kitchen. It’s ranked as one of the best restaurants in the area, and they have a split filet which is to-die-for, and things like mac and cheese with green chilis.

On our way north to Colorado, for tomorrow’s rally, we’re going to stop….. at the Grand Canyon. There is so much to explore in America.

We could stay here for a very long time. To heck with DC.

Don’t oversleep and miss the bus in the morning! We’re busy Trump Supporters this week!

George Soros' "New Way Forward Act"

The “New Way Forward Act” is one of the latest George Soros machinations. Last week many people’s attention were drawn to it, and then just as quickly moved on as the events of the week shifted.
But George Soros has not given up, and clearly is back in the news cycle, thanks to – surprisingly – an Alan Dershowitz bombshell: George Soros showed up on an FBI 302 form as the originator of an investigation against an as yet unnamed individual *cough cough* . . . sorry about that folks, hope that’s not the Corona virus . . .
Briefly let’s revisit the “New Way Forward Act” from Tucker Carlson’s segment on Fox News:

In short, the “New Way Forward Act” flips all of our immigration system upside down on its head.
Instead of deporting aliens, they will be invited in.
Instead of trying aliens in court, they will have a fast path to citizenship and voting rights.
Instead of engaging in protective quarantining, illegal aliens will be given full health care coverage free of charge at the expense of taxpayers.
Instead of flying illegal aliens back to their country of origin, taxpayers will pay for any person ever deported at any time to be flown back into the United States.
This is 100% George Soros.
This is 100% Open Society Foundations – formerly the Open Society Institute.
This is 100% Karl Popper “The Open Society and its Enemies”.
What they are doing becomes clear when you understand what is behind it.
This is KARL POPPER’S DREAM.
But first is it important to know that George Soros was a follower of Karl Popper. Other than academics and philosophers, most people have no knowledge of Karl Popper or his philosophical impact.
George Soros fancies himself as the protege that has grown beyond his master. Undoubtedly he would believe himself to be able to school Popper if he were alive today.

Understanding Popper and his “Open Society”

Karl Popper is described by The WikiPedias – the fount of all that is truthy on the interwebz – as “an Austrian-born British philosopher, academic and social commentator”. “In political discourse, he is known for his vigorous defense of liberal democracy and the principles of social criticism that he believed made a flourishing open society possible. His political philosophy embraced ideas from major democratic political ideologies, including socialism/social democracy, libertarianism/classical liberalism and conservatism, and attempted to reconcile them.”
As we will see, his idea of “liberal democracy” is one that we should take with a grain of salt.
Review: Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies
Review by Roy A. Childs, Jr.
{ PDF Link }
Nota Bene: I know this review is from a libertarian source. Nevertheless it is an invaluable explanation of Karl Popper’s worldview that animates “The Open Society”. Karl Popper’s vision of social engineering writ large is precisely the vision that George Soros is working to carry out.

Popper had produced his major work on the philosophy of science, Logik der Forschung (English ed., The Logic of Scientific Discovery, 1959), in 1934, and it was only natural that the politically aware philosopher would want to use his powerful, highly trained intellect to fight the forces of totalitarianism as they confronted the world at that time. Karl Popper moved to assault totalitarianism at its root.

Popper sees totalitarianism of all stripes as essentially tribal, as a “closed society,” a rebellion against the “strain of civilization.” He assaults it by using his philosophy of science (which greatly emphasizes “falsification,” i.e., the refutation of statements and theories) to criticize the doctrines of those whom Popper takes to be behind modern totalitarianism, namely, Plato, Aristotle, Hegel, and Marx. In The Open Society, he seeks to “examine the application of the critical and rational methods of science to the problems of the open society. [He] analyzes the principles of democratic social reconstruction, the principles of … ‘piecemeal social engineering’ in opposition to ‘Utopian social engineering.’”

Did you catch that?

. . . Popper’s Open Society . . . begins by wrestling with such giants as Plato, Hegel, and Marx, but concludes with little more than a defense of social democracy, of piecemeal engineering with freedom of discussion and controversy. Brian Magee ably summarizes Popper’s reasons for defending the “Open Society”:

Because he regards living as first and foremost a process of problem-solving he wants societies which are conducive to problem-solving. And because problem-solving calls for the bold propounding of trial solutions which are then subjected to criticism and error elimination, he wants forms of society which permit of the untrammelled assertion of different proposals, followed by criticism, followed by the genuine possibility of change in the light of criticism. Regardless of any moral considerations… he believes that a society organized on such lines will be more effective at solving its problems, and therefore more successful in achieving the aims of its members, than if it were organized on other lines.

Such a society is what Popper takes to be social democracy, entailing the “problem-solving” of piecemeal social engineering.

Ah, “social democracy”, does this sound familiar?
In other words, Popper advocates for what we would describe as a FAKE SCIENCE approach that engages in huge social experimentation writ large.
The enlightened “social scientist” – standing above and astride society, no doubt – looks down on all human society globally, and sees for himself the social fabric of civilization a grand laboratory within which, by choosing policy prescriptions many of which he knows will be destructive, can engage in unfettered social experimentation to find the right mix of conditions in which mankind will find ideal peace, harmony, and globalism. In other words, ends for society directed by a scientific and technocratic elite, to the expense of the individual citizen or voter. The deplorable masses need someone else to determine what is best for them, don’t you know.
History, to the “social scientist”, does not serve as a guide for understanding how societies and civilizations have already experimented and learned through great and often tragic cost how to live together. No, the “social scientist” is a believer in pure scientism, which is to say that knowledge only comes through scientific analysis, not through, say, an understanding of history.
This approach, however, is nothing really new or innovative:

This social democracy may indeed have once inspired the intellectual elite of the West, seeking (as many were) alternatives to fascism and communism, but today it inspires hardly anyone. And for good reason, for what else is democratic social reconstruction but that postwar system of fine-tuning the economy, the reign of countless redistributive social programs designed by politicians and social scientists to meet those alleged “social needs” that a host of interest groups are pressing upon the political systems of the West as “non-negotiable demands”? Since the Second World War, most of the Western democracies have followed Popper’s advice about piecemeal social engineering and democratic social reform, and it has gotten them into a grand mess. Intervention has been piled upon intervention; regulations have been continually modified in unpredictable ways (Popper advocates such “revisions” in the light of experience); taxation has increased drastically to finance social welfare programs (as has inflation, with its resulting economic fluctuations); and the unhampered market economy, so forcefully defended by Popper’s close friend F.A. Hayek, has been “reformed” out of existence.

Writing in 1976, Roy Childs observes:

Interventionism, piecemeal or not, has worked its inevitable way, and has led to precisely those consequences that Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, and others had predicted: economic stagnation and political conflict. Democratic institutions themselves are threatened by those whose vested interests are entwined with the State apparatus. Dime store tinkering, even with freedom of criticism and revision, is leading to the closed society that Popper so fears. There is indeed nothing new in this warning: it is the theme of both Ludwig von Mises’ Socialism and of F.A. Hayek’s Road to Serfdom.

In short, the Open Society is not enough. Why this is so has a direct bearing on the major themes of Popper’s book. . .

If the Open Society is equivalent to a society in which everything and anything is open to democratic revision—except the basic institutions that make democratic revision possible—then Popper is only focusing on one need of human beings (that a dubious collective need), not the broader need for liberty that is implied in the outline of his argument as stated by Magee. Popper makes a great deal of noise about “individualism,” but nevertheless only applies the structure of that argument to collective processes of hypothesis, testing (action), and revision in the light of experience; the argument would apply to individuals as well, since they are the sole constituents of “society,” By focusing on this collective democratic character of the Open Society, Popper ignores the more basic need for individual liberty in art, business, science, and all other areas as well.

The arguments for democracy that Popper presents, then, are in principle identical to arguments for individual liberty. It is the principle of nonaggression, the first principle of liberty, that properly limits the domain of democracy. If Popper’s arguments for democracy (as opposed to his advocacy of democracy itself) are valid, then it is not the rigidity of a technology of social engineering that we should seek, but an unhampered market economy, where people can constantly act on their own judgment and can continually revise their plans in accordance with the new. information brought by change. This brings us not to social democracy, but to the doctrine of libertarianism.

Far more important than the principle of democracy, then, even by Popper’s own arguments, is the principle of individual liberty. Liberty is paramount, democracy at best secondary: democracy is important only insofar as it is a servant of and means to the end of liberty. Thus, in following the logical implications of Popper’s views (which are not, after all, that original), we move from the open society to the “Free Society,” and find ourselves agreeing with Michael Polanyi’s claim, contra Popper, that the Free Society is not an Open Society, but a society committed to a very definite set of rules. In Popper’s Open Society, the principle of democracy is regarded as fixed, as not being open to revision. In the Free Society, is it the far more fundamental principle of individual liberty and nonaggression that is not open to revision (though its implications may be refined with growing knowledge). Popper’s reasoning is, by and large, correct, but it is individuals who must solve problems to survive, not “societies,” and therefore individuals who must be free to think and act to achieve values and to revise mistaken plans and impressions in the light off experience or more critical thought. . . .

No mere democratic machinery, no mere procedure, is enough to oppose fascism or communism, not in a world of those real social dynamics that are set in motion by interventionism. Only liberty can fully oppose closed societies, and only if liberty is seen as something that is not to be bargained away or abandoned through a series insignificant piecemeal reforms. Liberty must be regarded as the ultimate political end, foremost among those political values held dear by reasonable men and women, the highest and most noble political form possible to human beings. . . .

Social democracy, the Open Society, has been tried and found wanting. The question that faces us now is simply whether those lovers of “experiment” and “flexibility” are experimental and flexible enough to advocate that liberty be given a chance. If it is not given that chance, there may be no turning back, and we may yet arrive in an era when we shall look back at the totalitarianism of the 1930s as a veritable golden age.

But in one sense, at least, Popper is right: the future is ours to shape. Liberty has never been fully tried. It is the task of readers of this journal to remedy that unfortunate situation; if we do not, no one else will.

 

The Open Society is a grand globalist social experiment. National populations are the guinea pigs. Losses at the expenses of the people are an expected and necessary part of the process. Scientific experimentation is a necessary part of the process to achieving the ideal end state of global harmony – the more experimentation and bolder the intents the better. Nationalism and religious identity is the enemy; Globalism is the cure.
That’s to Open Society in a nutshell.

New Way Forward Act Won’t be Enacted into Law, Will it?

We have some good news – Donald Trump tweeted out for us to see: “Don’t worry, it won’t happen!”

But the question remains: Why is the left presenting it right here, right now, if the entire exercise is doomed to failure and merely symbolic?
Vigilance is important. The left is overplaying its hand, again. They always do this when they are about to put up a BIG fight over something.
That something, obviously, is a fight over Trump’s plans for immigration reform.
There could be many reasons why this is being promoted now, but the most obvious reason is to move the Overton Window of what seems to be plausible and reasonable in the political discourse all the way over to the left.
BE AWARE: Soros and company are about to go ALL IN on making anyone opposing their radical immigration agenda appear to be racists and xenophobes for opposing illegal alien invasions (aka “immigration”).
Also note that CONgress does NOT “Write” Bills. They are BOUGHT to PROMOTE them. The New Way Forward Act is being seeded from the outside.
Some of our QTree folks have identified the Congressional players behind this:
Bill Sponsors:
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/116/hr5383/details
Note the following three cosponsors in Texas – hoping to turn Texas blue:
Sponsor: Rep. Garcia, Jesus G. “Chuy” [D-IL-4] |
Cosponsors:
Rep. Escobar, Veronica [D-TX-16]*
Rep. Garcia, Sylvia R. [D-TX-29]*
Rep. Green, Al [D-TX-9]
https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/5383/cosponsors?r=61&s=1&q=%22cosponsor-state%22:%22Texas%22&searchResultViewType=expanded&KWICView=false
Lots of CA and NY, all the usual suspects ….Al Green, Hank Johnson, Fredrica Wilson, Alcee Hastings, and of course The Squad.
Right now, there is not a likelihood that the bill will pass the Senate, and even if it did, it would face the Presidential veto. There would not be enough legislative willpower in the Senate to overcome the veto.
There is of course the left’s hope that they could recover the Senate.
But keep in mind, even without the legislature, the left will be able to enact the law, if they achieve their dream of reclaiming the Presidency:

{ FULL THREAD }
Tweet reads:

People misunderstand the strategy.
The Green Neal Deal and the New Way Forward Act–the latter abolishes all US immigration laws–were not meant to pass in Congress.
The Democratic president will order them implemented.

There you have it.
The strategy is simple: Replace the POTUS (whatever means that requires) and once the right puppet person is in office, declare the New Way Forward law by Executive fiat.

The Road from Popper to Serfdom

Thinking back to Karl Popper’s “Open Society”, once you understand how badly distorted the lenses are, it becomes obvious why the radical left’s perception of reality is upside down.
Popper supposed that the only way to end “tribalism” is to destroy all borders and mix all people together. Crime and other problems were expected contingencies that would be a necessary, intermediate phase before the final phase would be achieved: a singular homogeneous global citizenry identity devoid of national, civic, and religious identifications. In a word, Babel.

Soros is a TRUE BELIEVER. A cynic would say he is not a believer but a malicious actor. Let’s avoid getting into an either/or argument when both/and are possibilities and likely. He tutored at the feet of Popper and his BAMN – By Any Means Necessary – outlook is there to reinforce his goals. In his arrogant elitism he probably sees himself as the apprentice who has become greater than the master.

Why for example is Soros supporting the activities of the Acton Institute, a Catholic think tank specializing in Austrian Economics? If you understand the political reality strictly in MCM (mind control media) terms of left/right you will be blind to what they are up to.
For the last decade since the Tea Party the key piece has been undermining social conservatism. This has meant invading conservatism with libertarianism – a political ideology that Soros crew finds quite agreeable. Social libertarianism undermines all social conservatism – it operates subversively by finding “common ground” with social conservatives in terms of “economic conservatism”.
Even though “economic conservative” means “free” trade rather than “fair” trade, and economic globalism. The opposite of the Trump Doctrine on International Trade.
The libertarian tactic worked during the Obama administration, because when it was all hands on deck to deal with the onslaught of leftist economic ideas, one started fighting with whatever ideological weapons were at hand – there wasn’t time to ask questions about who made the ammo.
Meanwhile the effects have been achieved: a downplay of civic, religious and national identity.
A perfect routing of the resolve of Americans to fight back by an insurgent enemy seeking to undermine Americans will to fight. Classic PsyOps. Classic enemy COINT operations.

Big Evangelicalism Rushes to do George Soros’ Bidding

Here is a recent Tom Littleton article:
SEX OFFENDER RESETTLEMENT IN YOUR COMMUNITY: ERLC “REFORMS” /CHURCH HIGHLANDS FAITH BASED MINISTRY HAS LED THE WAY.

“FAITH BASED PARTNERSHIPS ARE BEYOND PROBLEMATIC- AS BAPTIST ERLC PUSHES FOR PRISON REFORM AND CHURCH OF THE HIGHLANDS SEEKS TO HOUSE SEX OFFENDERS IN RESIDENTIAL COMMUNITIES, THIS ONE IS AMONG THE WORST.”

The Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (the “ERLC”, the left wing political action arm of the SBC recently caught taking money from George Soros’s “Evangelical Immigration Table” or EIT. Tom Littleton documents a shocking list of things that) is promoting through the Chambers of Commerce and the State Governors offices to release sex offenders into local residential communities, without the community’s knowledge or approval:

A little more than a year and a half ago some residence of Northeast Alabama near Muscle Shoals discovered a local motel in their residential community had begun the transition to a half way house for prisoners in a new program called Prison Re-entry , a work release program in a Faith Based Partnership with the Department of Corrections, Church of the Highlands/ Life Link and local business men. . .
Already scheduled to be moved into the half way house were around 6 to 7 inmates the majority of whom were to be newly released sex offenders. Total capacity for the facility was proposed at 35-40 residents. Not only were local members of the community never informed of the plan or given opportunity to object to it, the local website tracking such offenders whereabouts had never been updated to include the motel and its residence in what the Re-entry “industry ” refers to as “clustering sex offenders”.

This raises a slew of questions. Why is a Southern Baptist organization partnering with George Soros and programs that endanger communities?
The answers to those questions is troubling and will have to be taken up on a later post.

“The Snake”

On her way to work one morning
Down the path along side the lake
A tender hearted woman saw a poor half frozen snake
His pretty colored skin had been all frosted with the dew
“Poor thing,” she cried, “I’ll take you in and I’ll take care of you”
“Take me in tender woman
Take me in, for heaven’s sake
Take me in, tender woman,” sighed the snake

She wrapped him all cozy in a comforter of silk
And laid him by her fireside with some honey and some milk
She hurried home from work that night and soon as she arrived
She found that pretty snake she’d taken to had been revived
“Take me in, tender woman
Take me in, for heaven’s sake
Take me in, tender woman,” sighed the snake

She clutched him to her bosom, “You’re so beautiful,” she cried
“But if I hadn’t brought you in by now you might have died”
She stroked his pretty skin again and kissed and held him tight
Instead of saying thanks, the snake gave her a vicious bite
“Take me in, tender woman
Take me in, for heaven’s sake
Take me in, tender woman,” sighed the snake
“I saved you,” cried the woman
“And you’ve bitten me, but why?
You know your bite is poisonous and now I’m going to die”
“Oh shut up, silly woman,” said the reptile with a grin
“You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in
“Take me in, tender woman
Take me in, for heaven’s sake
Take me in, tender woman,” sighed the snake

2-19-20 Midweek Musings

6th Ordinary Sunday
February 16, 2020

“Godly Choices”

Sirach 15:15-20
1 Corinthians 2:6-10
Matthew 5:17…37

My Brothers and Sisters in the Lord –

As human beings we have to make decisions everyday. Our work, our relationships, our leisure and recreation are constantly dependent upon our choices and decisions. People who are mature usually make decisions based upon what is right and good, best, most effective and efficient, and beneficial to everyone involved.

However, sometimes we do not choose this way. We want to take the easy way out, the short-cut – any selfish way that serves ourselves. Perhaps we even choose a way that we know is the wrong way. Unfortunately, we always pay a price when we make a bad decision. Things go awry; someone gets injured; we receive a bad report; someone we love is hurt; or a relationship is damaged!

The Book of Sirach counsels us always to choose the godly way of doing things.

Being able to know what is good and right and true is why God gave us a conscience and an inherent moral sense. God even went a step further when He gave Moses the Ten Commandments which cover everything – if we read between the lines and ask for the Spirit’s guidance!

But God also gave us free will. We can decide or choose contrary to what God wants and expects from us. We can jump into water or fire; we can choose eternal life or death, by our decisions in the here and now for good or for evil. Moreover, what is tragic is that choosing evil always puts us on a slippery slope. One bad choice often leads to another and to another – until we can feel hopelessly lost and beyond change or salvation.

Fortunately, God never gives up on us as long as we are alive. God is merciful and forgiving. God is lavish with His grace. He gave us a conscience to begin with – He allows us to experience shame and guilt to get our attention when we have done wrong. It remains for us to repent of our sins, change our ways, and begin to make up for all of our wrongdoing.

Of course, we always suffer in some way for the sins and the mistakes we have made – because there are natural consequences to our bad choices. Children can learn this at an early age, if their parents allow them to suffer the consequences of their misbehavior and mistakes. Good parenting always sets limits for children and is not afraid of tough love when children test or exceed those limits.

In St. Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus expands upon the letter of the law in the Ten Commandments. He teaches us the way to real honesty and authenticity as disciples and children of God. We can’t be like the Pharisees who bent the Commandments to serve themselves – and to excuse truly reprehensible behavior.

Murder is wrong, but so is anything that hurts the body, the soul, or the psyche of another! Adultery is forbidden, but so is anything in our minds or hearts that violates the opposite sex for our own selfish pleasure! Even divorce should be rare – and only when the marriage was a sham from the beginning and devoid of covenant love and commitment.

Jesus also tells us how important it is to break with those people or things which are instrumental in our downfall. We must make the tough decision to cut ourselves off from whatever leads us into sin and away from God.

Finally, in the New Testament reading, St. Paul warns us not to be taken in by the current culture. The wisdom and the ways of God are never those of the world.

The faithful Jews had to resist and reject all the pseudo-wisdom of the pagan Greek culture which had spread everywhere. Likewise, we must resist all that the media, the entertainment industry, and many politicians have to say about what is good and moral and right!

We must stand against and work to repeal some of our laws that go against the natural law and the order that God established for the human person!

Brothers and Sisters, it is a daunting task to stay faithful to God and to all that God asks of us in our world today. But with God’s grace we can face and live through whatever we encounter on our journey to the Kingdom.

So, let us pray today, that we always make truly godly choices in all that we do –
And may we inherit the eternal life that Jesus has promised!

Amen.

Msgr. Russell G. Terra, Parish Homilies, February 16, 2020
Saint Joseph Roman Catholic Church, Redding, CA

*http://nebula.wsimg.com/38ccdbc756166f2c5a4463a11f662ac9?AccessKeyId=988E4422E53CF0CF71CA&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

The heavens declare Thy glory, Lord,
in ev’ry star Thy wisdom shines;
but when our eyes behold Thy Word,
we read Thy Name in fairer lines.

The rolling sun, the changing light,
and nights and days Thy pow’r confess;
but the blest volume Thou hast writ
reveals Thy justice and Thy grace.

Sun, moon, and stars convey Thy praise
round the whole earth, and never stand:
so when Thy truth began its race,
it touched and glanced on ev’ry land.

Nor shall Thy spreading gospel rest
till through the world Thy truth has run,
till Christ has all the nations blest
that see the light, or feel the sun.

Great Sun of Righteousness, arise,
bless the dark world with heav’nly light;
Thy gospel makes the simple wise;
Thy laws are pure, Thy judgments right.

Thy noblest wonders here we view
in souls renewed and sins forgiv’n;
Lord, cleanse my sins, my soul renew,
and make Thy Word my guide to heav’n.

Isaac Watts 1674-1748

Dear KAG: 20200219 Open Thread

Mornin’ y’all. This morning, well….

And now for the obligatory message from our sponsors:

Here at the Q tree we believe in the concept of CIVIL open free speech and the discussion that fleshes out ideas. When commenting and participating in the OPEN discussion on this thread all comments MUST NOT CONTAIN personal threats, baiting, name calling, or other anti-social words fomenting hate, violence or destruction. Our host Wolfm00n has strict rules about that.

Fellow tree dweller Wheatie gave us some good reminders on the basics of civility in political discourse:

  1. No food fights.
  2. No running with scissors.
  3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

In addition, it is requested that there be no swinging from the chandeliers, celebratory gunfire, messing around with the nuclear weapons, and, please, everyone wash your hands.

Those who have things to say that do not fit the generally accepted limits of “civil” discussion, Wolf has provided a venue known as the UTree. Please, venture over there for any such thoughts and comments. This sort of thing is always a possibility on that site:

A few other vital notes:

Please, review these rules that our host Wolfm00n outlined toward the beginning of the growth of the tree itself. it won’t take long.

Ridiculing the other side, on the other hand…well….

__________________________________________________

From the First Chapter of the Book of James:

Know this, my dear brothers and sisters:
everyone should be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger
for anger does not accomplish
the righteousness of God.
Therefore, put away all filth and evil excess
and humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you
and is able to save your souls.

Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves.
For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer,
he is like a man who looks at his own face in a mirror.
He sees himself, then goes off and promptly forgets
what he looked like.
But the one who peers into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres,
and is not a hearer who forgets but a doer who acts;
such a one shall be blessed in what he does.

If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue
but deceives his heart, his religion is vain.
Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this:
to care for orphans and widows in their affliction
and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

As always, prayers for the fight against that which seeks to enslave us are welcome.

We ready for more “As the Swamp Turns”?