I am simply stunned by the behavior of the congressional Republicans who spent eight years blithely tolerating nominees for high office who cavalierly evaded pertinent questions about whether they would actually uphold the Constitution. They are the same congressional leaders who endorsed a cozy relationship between themselves and big wealth, corporate socialism and ranks upon ranks of lobbyists; who felt it perfectly appropriate to salt every regulatory commission with the very people that were supposed to be regulated. They seemed untroubled that the administrations under which they served set all time records for felony convictions of high government officials. They seemed unconcerned that our most recent president took unto himself the assumed powers of a near king with divine rights. They are the same leaders who presided over the astronomical explosion of the national debt to amounts that no longer make any sense to my limited math abilities, and happily authorized out of sight deficit spending for just about anything except that which would help rebuild America. They are the same leaders who refused any hint of bipartisan rapport with the minority at any time under any circumstance.
Now, over night, they have become the ethically pure minded minority, screaming bloody murder over every venal sin they can uncover, demanding limits to anything that might look like investment in America’s future (unless it involves tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy), and complaining that the current president’s unending conversations with them about needed economic legislation adds up to being ignored. All of a sudden deficits and debt matter, and yet they have no conception of what public investment actually means. They show every intention of sabotaging a stimulus package that might actually do something to help rebuild the basics of our economy and put in its place a namby-pamby piece of legislative sop so that at the next election they can wring their hands and say they tried.
Once I was a Republican. Yes, it’s true, and proud to be one. But if this party has any soul left at all it lies somewhere between the unredeemed Ebenezer Scrooge and Uriah Heep. And the worst part? The majority of them claim to follow Christ.
\”And the worst part? The majority of them claim to follow Christ.\”And?Under the wall paper of theology, perhaps they do!We have managed to theologize our way to any number of definitions of \”following Christ\”. Heck we have even turned following Jesus, believing he is the Christ, into an institution, with world power. Now how silly is that!?Perhaps their biggest sin, our biggest sin in all of this debacle, is that they are ignorant of our governmental design, and we (the people) have embraced this ignorance for our own gain. It is easy to justify gluttony and greed if one embraces the concept of a pagan God who knows what will be and has preordained all. It is easy to alleviate guilt for ones\’ own actions when we use \”God\’s will\” as an excuse. Isn\’t this the Christianity that they follow? we follow? We the chosen point fingers at those who are less pure/clean than us, lest they pollute our grace and cause our fall, and when we fall there is surly a punishing God, the cause of our calamity. Faith alone, atonement, predestination, predetermination, all layers of wallpaper over the God who is with us, the God who is one, the great I Am.And if you really want to offend, you might want to add that the people who minister to them, may want to pick out their millstones now, and avoid the rush.
Bruno,I was hoping you might wade in. Thank you. I shall now excuse myself to look for the log in my own eye and choose an appropriate millstone.CP
hoping I would wade in!!Now that is scary!!
CP, do you plan to begin \”opening up\” and sharing what you really think without pressure to be politically correct? 😉 Don\’t allow that pressure to blow a stint.Your comments reminded me of 8th grade history, where I had a teacher who could make it interesting. She taught us, \”It is the job of the party not in power to criticize the party in power.\” Thank goodness we still have at least two parties that are a little different. I hope they remember the importance of maintaining some differences, criticizing each with some respect, and presenting alternatives plans, without annihilating each other or the system in which they operate.There seems to be a lot of wrangling over how to effectively spend $900,000,000,000 +- to \”stimulate the economy.\” 900,000,000,000 dollars/300,000,000 people =3,000 dollars / person !!!! That is on top of the previously allocated $700,000,000,000. How could they move that much money and positively effect so few people?! How could have already spent $300,000,000,000 ($1000/person) with so little effect, except to maintain the lifestyles of the rich and infamous?
The intellectual who wants to do her work properly must today go back to the starting point: the woman whom she knows, and first of all to herself. It is at that level, and at no other, that she ought to begin to think about the world situation. Jacques Ellul I somhow believe that I enter these discussions with a clanging dissonanct note. I grew up hating nazies. Somehow I have tried to see the image of God in all humans even nazies because what lies in them also may lie in me. Steve I like you because you want to be on the side of the angels. Only prayer holds it all together.
How Can We Talk About , Love, Death, Courage and Evil?Andrew Delbanco ,” The Death of Satan” traces the transformation and death of the idea that the misbehavior of humans is determined by Satan. With the death of this myth modern man has learned to create hell on earth with such events as the holocaust. This week I saw the Italian film, “La Vita e dolce” or “Life is beautiful.” Set in late 1930s Arezzo, Italy, Guido Orefice (Roberto Benigni), a Jew uses cunning wit to win over an Italian schoolteacher. The film switches over to a Nazi concentration camp. Here in hell he uses his artifice to communicate with his wife and to protect his son from the soul searing realities of utter brutality if the German monsters who operate the camp with efficient and creative crudity. At the price of his life he saves them from the technology of death and delivers them back into society. The film is sobering, beautiful, and robs evil in this one instance of its victory. It gives hope against the finality of evil. But then again, by seeing the whole population cooperate with the evil I am remineded that its seeda are found in me. Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. Amen
OldG,Thanks for these words of gentle wisdom. CP