tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post2268862515884311066..comments2023-10-17T08:19:58.196-04:00Comments on FreeThinke: FreeThinkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16682678301019952436noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-59471995305685339232012-12-20T10:32:05.827-05:002012-12-20T10:32:05.827-05:00AA, if it matters, I think Gommorrah may contain t...AA, if it matters, I think Gommorrah may contain two m's as well as two r's. We need to look it up, but I can't really see how this poem has much to do with the "Cities of the Plain."<br /><br />It's about things far more hideous (in my estimation) than general licentiousness and homosexuality. It's an up close and personal look at the worst aspects of "Man's inhumanity to Man."<br /><br />I'm sorry to have to tell my fundamentalist Christian friends that there are far worse crimes than sexual relations between consenting adults of the same sex. The operant word, of course, is "consenting."<br /><br />The misapplication of religious doctrine to serve temporal Power Agendas gives organized religion of all sorts a great deal to answer for. (Take another look on this blog at <b>It's the Belligerence, Stupid!</b> posted in the archives for a thorough examination of my views on this sad subject.)FreeThinkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16682678301019952436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-48747170538539882922012-12-20T10:20:23.347-05:002012-12-20T10:20:23.347-05:00"Jesus won't save you from the horror, fr...<i>"Jesus won't save you from the horror, friend. At least not in this life."</i><br /><br />Ah! But He already HAS, Jack, -- many many times. Had it not been for Jesus, my life would have been a miserable affair, indeed, and probably would have ended long before now.<br /><br />Cultivating love for Jesus is not supposed to guarantee us immunity from tribulation. Instead it makes it possible for us to BEAR life's burdens and unspeakable challenges with equanimity and joyful expectation -- even in the worst of circumstances.<br /><br />That's what the Jews, who rejected Him, never understood. He did not come to subjugate the world. He came to show us how to subjugate the Ego -- the selfish, spiteful, vengeful, divisive, stingy, insensitive, overly acquisitive aspects of our individual selves.<br /><br />It's an INNER thing.<br /><br />And I assure you it's NOT a bunch of baloney.<br />FreeThinkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16682678301019952436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-32465643865488870292012-12-19T01:58:07.019-05:002012-12-19T01:58:07.019-05:00Sodom and Gomorrah all over again, and yes, I know...Sodom and Gomorrah all over again, and yes, I know, I probably spelled it wrong.Average Americanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17211406136371011324noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-62466946390172052952012-12-18T22:58:22.714-05:002012-12-18T22:58:22.714-05:00Jesus won't save you from the horror, friend. ...Jesus won't save you from the horror, friend. At least not in this life.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-87078211076932879402012-12-18T22:08:29.939-05:002012-12-18T22:08:29.939-05:00Powerful stuff you write, FT. Too bad so few pay a...Powerful stuff you write, FT. Too bad so few pay any attention to it. Lack of popularity is probably a sign of high quality. Maybe you ought to feel flattered?<br /><br /><br />------------> Katharine HeartburnAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-77019250657124326722012-12-18T17:34:07.126-05:002012-12-18T17:34:07.126-05:00Go not far from me, O God.
Cast me not away from T...<i><b>Go not far from me, O God.<br />Cast me not away from Thy Countenance.<br />Forsake me not when my strength faileth me.<br /><br />O, let my mouth be filled with Thy praise<br />That I may sing of Thy Glory all the day long!</b></i><br /><br />Those are the words (as well as I can recollect them) of an anthem by Zingarelli we used to sing in the church choir when I was still in my teens.<br /><br />I happened to a fragment of it in an episode of Matlock last Sunday where Andy Griffith was directing his church choir.<br /><br />I hadn't thought of it in years. The last time was when I hastily made a three-part transcription of it for my little choir in a rural parish where we had no tenors.<br /><br />Every day I thank God for my religious training and all the wonderful experience I've had from singing solos as a boy soprano in an Episcopal boys choir to playing the role of a full-fledged "Kappellmeister," who did his best to emulate Johann Sebastian by writing at least one new piece of service music -- either an anthem, a set of liturgical responses, an organ voluntary, a descant to an old hymn tune, or an alternative accompaniment to a familiar hymn -- every week in the last ten years of my humble 40-odd-year career as a church musician.<br /><br />The Bible readings each of us took turns sharing each morning in school as soon as we could read meant little at the time -- it was just unexciting routine -- but as the years have gone by and challenges have mounted the training I had as a boy has risen to the surface and stood me in good stead.<br /><br />I sincerely believe we have lost our way as a nation, because several generations have been deprived of these experiences by Court Edict -- and because popular entertainment and the world of all-pervasive electronic devices that grab our attention and pull us away from one another have cut us off from essential moral and spiritual nourishment.<br /><br />FreeThinkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16682678301019952436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-51061919201102098972012-12-18T16:50:07.363-05:002012-12-18T16:50:07.363-05:00"... most people are hostile to Truth, becaus..."... most people are hostile to Truth, because it rarely flatters them, and therein lie ALL our greatest difficulties."<br /><br />Indeed I have noticed that. I take special delight in putting forth uncomfortable truths. Obviously not everybody likes that. But so be it.<br /><br />I don't see any light at the end of the tunnel unless it's the truth train coming at us.<br /><br />Merry Christmas to you and your readers.<br /><br />Waylonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08533895509055020394noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-41691743234146515242012-12-18T16:19:24.059-05:002012-12-18T16:19:24.059-05:00A very sobering post, FT.
I've checked in and...A very sobering post, FT.<br /><br />I've checked in and read this post several times. It makes me think of Herman Melville's poem "Shiloh."Always On Watchhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08192688822955022541noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-55359542140166671772012-12-18T12:02:49.384-05:002012-12-18T12:02:49.384-05:00Here in the last words of today's post is the ...Here in the last words of today's post is the answer to your question, Waylon:<br /><br /><br /><b>How, when we need to ask questions like this now more than ever, could we imagine even for a moment we have no need for the healing power and redeeming grace of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ?</b><br /><br /><br />I shared QUESTIONS with an old friend, and she wrote back: TOO STRONG!<br /><br /><br />Yes. It is, but so is the world in which we must live where things like this happen all the time.<br /><br /><br />How could we hope to overcome the worst in us without confronting it directly every now and then?<br /><br /><br />I see today's poem as an excellent companion piece to yesterday's musical offering. The confusion, violence and distress Dupré indicates in The World Awaiting the Savior is echoed in plainer language in today's provocative, deliberately unpleasant poem.<br /><br /><br />There IS an antidote. There IS a solution, but it could never be implemented universally. It must come to each individually with a change of heart with the realization that SELF-control is the only worthwhile kind. All others imply the establishment of tyranny to enable them to work.<br /><br /><br />Tyrannical policies have within them the seeds of their own destruction, because out most basic urge and our deepest need is to be free.<br /><br /><br />The Christ asks us to surrender Self to Him (Truth) as THE means of gaining the liberty we so long for.<br /><br /><br />A paradox, indeed, but then isn't all existence exactly that?<br /><br /><br />We keep looking for PHYSICAL or LEGALISTIC solutions to our most basic challenges. I truly believe our only hope lies in nourishing Mind Soul and Spirit with ideals and values based on Truth and Love.<br /><br /><br />In case you hadn't noticed most people are hostile to Truth, because it rarely flatters them, and therein lie ALL our greatest difficulties.<br /><br /><br /><b>MERRY CHRISTMAS!</b><br /><br /><br />~ FT<br />FreeThinkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16682678301019952436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-145653764764266444.post-75626518676549231902012-12-18T10:27:51.036-05:002012-12-18T10:27:51.036-05:00What's up with the morbidity? Did you get up o...What's up with the morbidity? Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed or this this another you manifesting itself?<br /><br />Came across this item today which relates in some ways to what you have said:<br /><br />The Shootings, The Globalists and Gun Control: The 2nd Phase of Disarming Americans<br /><br />http://beyondthephysical.blogspot.ca/2012/12/the-shootings-globalists-and-gun.htmlWaylonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08533895509055020394noreply@blogger.com