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Saturday, November 23, 2013

Cats, Dog, and Human Beings

Lamont leapt deftly to the top level of the step thinky and began to address his sisters, Pawline and Patchtricia. “Dear sisters,” he began. “The other day I promised you a lecture on the basic natures of furless and furred beings. I am now prepared to share that address with you.”


Paw and Patch dutifully if not happily took up positions in front of the fireplace and prepared themselves to listen attentively to their brother.

“To begin this oration I think I will begin with a fellow furred creature who often share furless beings house with, dogs, “began Lamont. His sisters both rotated their ears toward their brother with true interest at this novel beginning. “Dogs, it appears to me are for the most part pure souls who seem totally devoted to their furless owners. In fact, they seem down right dotty about their devotion. They typically jump up and down, barking, and getting overly excited at the sight of their furless owners, and I use the word “owners” advisedly in this case. They lick and slobber all over them and will perform ridiculous tricks to please their owners. And if the have a baby furless being they seem totally devoted to them and will do anything and put up with anything to keep these poor little helpless creature happy. It is no wonder that many furless beings prefer dogs over cats and other creatures they call pets. It does not speak well of either dogs or their owners.

“On the other hand, we cats understand the relationship between ourselves and our servant furless critters. Oh, like dogs, we will rub up against them, purr when the pet us, and are generally affectionate with them, because we know it is for our mutual benefit. But our human servants also know full well that in the midst of all this mutual affection we can just walk off and ignore them and spend most of our times in personal grooming and reflection. They also know that they had better be careful as we may attack them at anytime without warning with our razor like claws. We do not judge ourselves harshly for this behavior, it is just our playful nature we exhibit when we play with each other, and we forget how fragile the furless ones are. Besides, we just get bored with them when other things strike our mind.

“Our human servant counterparts are not unlike ourselves. They have selfish reasons for wanting as “pets” because we entertain them, show them affection when we feel affectionate and the like. They are like that as well. They find great enjoyment in playing with us, and hearing our purrs, but they can also get bored and leave us, often for long periods of time. In fact, they can get annoyed with us. For instance, Meugh seems downright bothered when I walk in front of his computer screen and on his keyboard when he is doing things on it. I rather like seeing his reaction, which is why I do it with some regularity.

“I also am perfectly cognizant of both cats and furless ones that are downright evil in their behavior. I know cats that will kill their own and are just downright belligerent toward all furless beings. I believe this is because of early traumatic incidents in their lives. I think the same is true of furless ones who can be incredibly cruel to other creatures. They may kick dogs and the dogs often come slinking back to get kicked some more. We cats won’t put up with such behavior if at all possible. We are just tougher than dogs as any dog who has had his ass kicked by a cat knows. I also know there are furless one who go out and shoot furred critters for fun. Now we will kill, for necessity when we live outside or because our furless ones want mice eradicated. That is why we often bring these critters to them when we have done them in as presents and signs of our affection for them. And, we will play, sometimes roughly with critters like mice or bugs because they intrigue us and sometimes we get carried away with the play and they die.

“In conclusion dear sisters, I find the cat and furless servants behavior and natures are quite similar. We serve our own interests but we also have the capacity of affection between our two species. We can even be affection with other species such as dogs if it fits our fancy. Dogs on the other hand…go figure as to why they act as they do; they appear a bit simple.

“I suspect that some human beings prefer dogs over cats because dogs allow them to feel godlike as the stupidly affection dogs idolize them. This is not a good thing, they would be far better off with similar natured creatures such as us. Unfortunately not of furless servants are as enlightened to understand our similar nature. Either than or they are just too self-centered.”


With that said Lamont descended from his lecturing position and curled up with his sisters in their respective place for naps.


Saving Souls

When folk generally hear the phrase “saving souls” I think they probably think of those evangelists who want to save souls for God’s kingdom. This used to happen in revival meetings when a man, apparently more religious than local clergy would come to town and put up a big tent, holler about fire and brimstone and the perils of going to hell and then ask people to come forward to be “saved” by pledging the belief in our savior Jesus Christ.

Many evangelical churches today included this coming forward as part of their service. In both cases getting saved was a matter of confessing belief in Jesus as Savior, and that act would guarantee you eternal life.

I have a couple of problems with this concept of saving souls. First, no human being, whether they call themselves an evangelist or a prune Danish ever saved anyone else. One person, Jesus Christ, saved everybody at Golgotha when he died on the cross for human sins, or those things, which separate us from God, accomplished that. Folk who claim they save others are egotistical ill informed theologians. A side part of this is the mistaken belief that we cause our salvation by choosing to belief in Jesus. I am an old Calvinist who believes the actor here is God who calls us to belief to which we are irresistibly drawn.

The second problem I have with this is that it limits the saving of souls to just belief. At root here is how we regard soul. A common definition is that soul refers to our spiritual aspect, or the essence of who we are in contrast to just being physical beings. It is also equated with our moral aspects.

A friend of mine once opined why was it that nobody ever asked him “How does it go with your soul?” A common greeting we use is “how are you?” referring to our physical health; he was getting to why is we don’t ask about each other about our spiritual health.

As I said before, I don’t think we can do a thing about saving anyone’s soul, that’s is God’s prevue, but there is a great deal we can do about helping others with the condition of their soul, their essence the moral well being.

Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, believed that by following certain scientific principles a person could become a “clear” or their soul could be perfected. Or, more crassly put, it is found in the phrase, “I’ve got my shit totally together.” In my opinion nobody ever gets there but are always in the process of getting it together.

I think the condition of people’s and even national soul’s are in deep trouble today. Consider the souls of crass materialists who will do anything for the almighty dollar, the bottom line. How is it with the souls of those bankers who took advantage of their customers to gamble and lose in the market and kept money for themselves? How goes it with the souls of CEO and the like who feel justified in earning 400 times of those who work in their companies? How goes it with the souls of politicians who emphasis re-election and power and jobs with businesses who give them money for their campaigns and promise to give them great jobs after their political careers? How goes it with the soul of the nation and allow a small percentage of people to have most of the wealth of the country and turn a deaf ear to those in need? How goes it with souls of employers who do not pay their workers a living wage?

I would also ask how goes it with the souls of veterans who fight for our country, who experience the hells of combat and coming home with post traumatic syndromes, and other traumas and find a country not willing to give them adequate help in helping their souls? How about the souls of those born into poverty, who though they work hard, cannot get a living wage to provide for their families? How goes it with the souls of those who are discriminated because of race, religious belief, ethnicity, sexual preference, or the sex period? Of course this list could go on and on, but you get the idea; we don’t not appear to care that much about the condition of each other’s souls.

A fella once told me that the only thing a pastor should do is save souls, be an evangelists. Realizing that anything I would say to him would fall on deaf ears, I just smiled and changed the subject, but I could not disagree with him more. As a pastor, I felt no responsibility to save souls in terms of saving them in the old fashioned sense of eternal life; that was God’s job. But I did believe I had great responsibility in helping folks with their souls. To teach them over and over again the stories of scripture that were soul building, to give the exposure to morals and values that would make for a more soul fulfilled life. As for evangelical work, meaning in this case getting more folk in the church, that was primarily the role of the members of the church.

So, I ask you my dear readers, how goes it with your soul? What are you doing to enhance your spiritual well being? What are you doing to help others in their spiritual needs? This is the giving the returns gifts manifold, and comforts our own souls.

I worry about the soul of friends and family and of our nation. I believe we live in a primarily secular materialistic society that promotes values that are bad for our souls. But I also don’t believe that God will ever give up on us, we will equip us to help us in soul mending of ourselves and others if we are just open to such a calling.


How goes it with your soul?


Friday, November 22, 2013

The Cats Converse about the First Snowfall

“I pity those poor furless critters,” said Lamont.

“Why is that?” inquired Patchtricia.

“Well, you’ve been looking out the window this morning and seeing all the white stuff on the ground. It’s called snow,” said Lamont.

“We know it’s snow dummy,” retorted Pawline. “We lived outside a long time before Meugh brought us into the Shackteau. We lived in snow almost an entire winter, and had to snuggle together in the little heated house our furless servants make for us. Yuck, we certainly remember snow. But what does that have to do with pitying the furless critters?

“It’s obvious, said Lamont. “They don’t have fur coats like we do, they are furless. Well Meugh has some whiskers, which are a little bit like fur, but he keeps them so short I don’t think it keeps him warm. And Mewreen has no fur at all. So, they have to put on layers of clothing, artificial fur to keep warm all the time. Their clothing can not compare to our nice warm fur, nor is it as nice to touch.”

“I think that is why they like to pet and brush us so much each evening,” chimed in Patch. It’s nice to have them pet and brush our lovely fur and keep it shiny. I’m not sure why they do it but I suspect they do it for two reasons.”

“What reasons?” asked Paw.

“First, of all I think it is because the love us; that’s most important. But I also think they might do it out of a little bit of envy since they don’t have nice fur coats. Furless critters are not as pure of heart as we cats you know.”

“That is a significant observation of the basic nature of furless beings and furred beings. I am preparing a lecture on that that I will share with you soon on the subject,” injected Lamont.

“Oh, we’ll look forward to that,” replied Patch with a little smirk as she winked at Paw. “We can hardly wait.”

“At any rate,” continued Lamont. “I feel sorry for those furless critters. The guys next-door working on our neighbor’s garage put on more and more layers of artificial fur each day and it gets colder outside. Poor buggers.”


“Poor buggers,” echoed Pawline and Patch as all three curled up in front of their fireplace.

Thursday, November 21, 2013

Major Issues vs. False and Misleading Rhetoric


I wish we could create a new party in this country that actually worked on the real issues the neither party seems to want to address. What could we call such a party? Public Servants Party?

Following is a list I have complied of major issues that I think we face today. It may not be all the issues but they are significant.

MAJOR ISSUES
1.    Distribution of wealth; now concentrated at the very top
2.    Struggling middle class and poor as a result of #1,
3.    Unequal voting power: rich can dominate campaigns with their wealth
4.    Bills written by lobbyists (ex-congressional leaders) rather than by legislator
5.    Infrastructure falling apart due to lack of investment
6.    Subsidies go to the wealthy rather than the poor, giving big business a marketing advantage
7.    Deregulation results in businesses too big to fail and wealth distribution issues
8.    Debt handling
9.    Health care: Obamacare does not go far enough; single payer system better in all ways. Our current profit driven health care system saps the entire economic system,
10. Has the country become too large to govern? Lack of accountability and anomie leads to depersonalization and name calling.
11. The entire political system has shifted to the right, leaving the progressive voice without a party to express its concerns.
12. Uncontrolled democracy/capitalism has degenerated into oligarchy or plutocracy
13. Climate, if not addressed we will cease. Alternative energy development
14. Can we continue a policy of being the world’s police force, often going it alone just for our personal interests.
15. Water – major issue being totally ignored.
16. Jobs: unions need strengthening; history shows when they are strong the middle class is strong.
17. Need for more government workers to enforce regulations (now smallest since 1966)  http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/22/bloated-government-federal-employment-at-47-year-low/?_r=0

a.    Federal employment is at a 47 year low. Lyndon Johnson era, 1966 we have 2,721,000 gov. employees. Now, Before gov. shutdown there were 2,723,000 fed employees. In 1966 that was 4.3% of the population, now it is 2%, the lowest; lower than when Bush was in office.

Next is a list of false and or misleading rhetoric both parties use is so-called political debate; sound an fury signifying nothing.


FALSE/MISLEADING RHETORIC
1.     Poor folk are poor because they are lazy and don’t want to work (Reagan false quote)
2.     Debt is bad rather than a regulator
3.     Democrats are the tax and spend party, when statistics show the opposite
4.     All unions are corrupt
5.     Social security and medicare will go away
6.     Obamacare will not work; raise taxes…. No proof and no track record
7.     Deregulated economy will put more money in individual pockets (trickle down) when nothing backs up this claim.
8.     Immigrants will take away our jobs (they get jobs nobody wants and earn their citizenship; scapegoating.
9.     Climate control no biggy, economics more important
10. Voter ID is necessary; meaning we don’t want certain folk to vote
11. Say they want to help small businesses, but really protect to big to fail corporations
12. Government is bad…


If you read the preceding article you see that I fall on the liberal side of these issues.