One of my challenges is to take what I believe in, what my faith tells me, and relate it to what is happening around me. The past few days, weeks, and months have provided me with numerous examples, but I have so far been silent.
Not any more. For some of my family or friends, warning, I will probably annoy you.
Frequently.
One of the tenants of my faith is the forgiveness that is abundantly given to all of us. We humans who make mistakes. Often. Some rather large. Some repeatedly.
My faith in this forgiveness comes from the teaching of Jesus, out of the Christian books of the New Testament.
It is therefore difficult for me to hear "Christians" not willing to allow human mistakes be forgiven, rather to be calling for strict punishment. Once again, my fellow "Christians", whose faith appears to be grounded in the Old Testament with a little of Jesus thrown in, separate themselves from me.
There are consequences for our actions, but what is the sense of welcoming Jesus, who proclaimed a new way of looking at the world, of relating to each other, of caring for each other, if every time a challenge comes along, Jesus is forgotten or pushed aside.
Why is there so much clamoring for a pound of flesh?
Why the emphasis on the negative?
This anti-Christ crap? The birthers?
I am astonished to hear the furor over the release of the two journalists recently held in North Korea. Rewards for bad behavior is what John Bolton has said.
This was not a case of not eating your vegetables and still getting dessert. This was hard labor, wives and mothers separated from husbands and child. Rewards?
If the case for saving was to have been deserving where would we all be?
Remember Jesus talking about separating us into two groups, those welcomed into heaven and those not? Remember him preaching that by taking care of the least of them, feeding the least of them, welcoming the stranger,that by doing so, we did it to him? He never said that the qualification for assistance was that the receiver believe in anything that the giver did.
Working towards caring for all of our citizens by reforming health care?
Nah, Jesus didn't mention health care. Or, why should I care about "them". Or, I work hard for what I have, let "them" do the same. I have mine, let them get theirs.
The time to live up to this is now. Step up to the plate.
Just do it.
On a personal note, my mother did not have health insurance in the latter part of her life until she could get on Medicare. At 64, she could not afford a policy.
She would have liked to have had an option, any option, that she could have afforded.
At 65, she died.
What about your mother, or his, or hers, or theirs?
What about your sister, or his, or hers, or theirs?
Father, brother, cousins, friends.
What about them?
Just get on with it.
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