The price of wheat.. any farmers out there?
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Posted:Mar 27, 2008 12:39 pm
Last Updated:Mar 27, 2008 4:08 pm 3920 Views
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I'm told the American farmers deliberatly stayed away from growing wheat last year to drive up the price of a loaf of bread. True?
Where I live farmers are not too happy with any level of government as many are getting away from farming. Sadly,at the same time the world is starving because of a lack of food.
The United States government I'm told is subsidizing corn for bio-fuel. Shouldn't a person's right to a meal come before fuel for our vehicles? Many crops are being grown today for the energy industry alone. If it comes down to governments making decisions on what a farmer grows (through incentives) where will we end up?
Please help me here. I am a green novice in the world of farming. But I know we all have to eat. Or do we?
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What to do with Iraq?
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Posted:Mar 27, 2008 7:16 am
Last Updated:Mar 29, 2008 8:25 pm 4084 Views
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If I were a godless communist and having to decide on America's dilemma in Iraq-- I would find God sooner or later! The answer can only be found through prayer.
Sadly, the recent major assault by the Iraqi troops backed up by Americans on a southern Iraq city is a big mistake. Just as the case in the execution of Saddam Hussein and others. Killing people in revenge is not an answer that will work. Check the history books. A major assault has never brought peace... just a pause in the violence.
The surge in troops was supposed to have brought some level of peace. It has not yet happened. And there is now the feeling that Bush will just hand this mess on to the next President. So sad.
I personally do not have an answer here. If American troops do leave there will be great amounts of blood shed in that country and the U.S. will be responsible for it-- and held accountable. If the troops stay-- the greater the chance of the loss of more American lives.
Let us pray. Ohh Lord-- give courage to these young men and women serving their country in a land you once walked upon. Give wisdom to their leaders that they might choose the right way out of this terrible mess. Give hope to the people living in Iraq that they will see a day of peace in days to come. Give patience where it is needed and most of all give the world some input to help solve this problem. ANd most of all we ask all of this through your own Jesus who loves us all and who wants this mess cleaned up soon. Amen
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Tibetan Monks deserve our support
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Posted:Mar 26, 2008 9:08 pm
Last Updated:Mar 27, 2008 7:39 am 4047 Views
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China is fighting back today over the violent incidents in Tibet, whereby the Chinese soldiers have been using force against the monks who are demonstrating for their human rights.
The Chinese government is placing the blame on the Dahlai Lama saying he is the one leading this group of demonstrators.
The Chinese people have no voice. They are governed by fascists who have no place for human rights in their view of the world.
I have always had great respect for the Dahlai Lama. He is another Ghandi of today. I cannot believe a single word coming from the Chinese about this man. He is holy and he is non violent.
Athletes need to realize that politics invades everything on earth just like a virus. If the Games in Beijing collapse on account of the actions of the Chinese government in Tibet-- then so be it.... regardless of the cost. Human rights are not something we can continue to ignore. If we do that in a democracy then there is no hope whatsoever within a communist fascist controlled regime like China.
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The stupidty of war
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Posted:Mar 26, 2008 9:05 am
Last Updated:Apr 20, 2008 9:51 pm 4069 Views
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In the 80s when I was still teaching school I used my voice to speak out vociferously against the testing of American Cruise missiles over Alberta air space. I took quite a beating then and still do.
Yesterday the news revealed that the Pentagon had mistakenly sent fuses of intercontinental nuclear missiles to Taiwan a few years ago for their weapons of mass destruction. Strange how this came as a huge surprise to the Pentagon.
It's also strange how Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were seen signing agreements on television recently giving Saddam Husein chemical weapons to use against Iran. Of course we know Hussein used these against the Kurds in his own Iraq.
The past president of Pakistan-- Musharif was considered public enemy number one by the United States prior to 9/11. He then was given planeloads of weapons and cash because the U.S. needed to get into Pakistan to get Bin Laden-- who is still at large.
Amazing how stupid war is isn't it? We need to do much more than pray for peace. Our world is in a shocking state of corruption at all levels. I have always claimed that the mere possession of nuclear weapons is itself illegal and immoral. The vast numbers of these weapons housed all over the United States robs American citizens of their health, their education, their housing and their dignity.
May God help us all.
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"None can speak of a wound with skill if he hath not a wound felt...."
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Posted:Mar 25, 2008 5:28 pm
Last Updated:Mar 26, 2008 8:26 am 4034 Views
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I was about 19 or 20 and studying philosophy when I came across this quotation. Sadly, I cannot recall its author-- but it's certainly not my own. How brilliant this person was to have put it so exactly.
Our own ability to empathize or sympathize can indeed be limited to our own experience of pain and sorrow. When you see athletes take such career ending blows how many of us can truly empathize with that person if we have never been in a similar circumstance?
I cannot truly understand what it is like to left as an orphan because my parents died of natural causes. I recall a boy I taught once whose father committed suicide. It affected him for the rest of his life ( up until that time when I knew him anyway-- 22 years). I remember talking to a psychologist once and he said if you ever want to really screw up your just go ahead and commit suicide. Of course he was right to some degree but not totally as we are not fatalistic. We determine our own course in life despite the actions of our parents.
DO we really need to experience all the different pains and sorrows in life in order to fully understand people? NO. I don't think so. But I know for sure it helps when we can refer back to a similar pain or sorrow in our own lives when discussing such with our friends who are hurting.
We will never know how Christ felt while suffering on the cross. His pain was not just physical. He knew what it was like to have been rejected and despised, insulted. It is this pain that we can go to Him now with and ask Him to understand our pain, our own suffering when we feel such pain and sorrow. He can understand the person behind bars who is innocent; the wounds we carry when we are fired from our jobs and rejected by our peers. He can speak of many wounds because Christ has truly felt them all.
Let us pray for our friends who carry hurts, wounds and multiple sorrows. Let them know that they are not alone and we care for them.
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The Resurrection Homily of St. John Chrysostom
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Posted:Mar 23, 2008 6:39 pm
Last Updated:Mar 25, 2008 7:29 pm 4189 Views
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St. John Chrysostom
(Chrysostomos, "golden-mouthed" so called on account of his eloquence).
Doctor of the Church, born at Antioch, c. 347; died at Commana in Pontus, 14 September, 407.
Please give this a read. St John Chrysostom was known in the early church as the greatest preacher that ever lived..
Let all pious men and all lovers of God rejoice in the splendour of this feast; let the wise servants blissfully enter into the joy of their Lord; let those who have borne the burden of Lent now receive their pay, and those who have toiled since the first hour, let them now receive their due reward; let any who came after the third hour be grateful to join in the feast and those who may have come after the sixth, let them not be afraid of being too late, for the Lord is gracious and He receives the last even as the first. He gives rest to him who comes on the eleventh hour as well as to him who has toiled since the first: yes, He has pity on the last and He serves the first; he rewards the one and is generous to the other; He repays the deed and praises the effort. Come you all: enter into the joy of your Lord. You the first and you the last, receive alike your reward; you rich and you poor, dance together; you sober and you weaklings celebrate the day; you who have kept the feast and you who have not rejoice today, The table is richly loaded; enjoy its royal banquet. The calf is a fatted one; let no one go away hungry. All of you enjoy the banquet of faith; all of you receive the riches of His goodness. Let no one grieve over his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed; let no one weep over his sins, for pardon has shone from the grave; let no one fear death, for the death of our saviour has set us free; he has destroyed it by enduring it. He has despoiled Hades, by going down into its kingdom. He had angered it by allowing to taste of His flesh. When Isaias foresaw all this, he cried out: "O Hades, you have been angered by encountering Him it is now captive. It seized a body and discovered God; it seized earth, and behold it encountered Heaven; it seized the visible and was overcome by the invisible. O death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory? Christ is risen and the angels rejoice, Christ is Risen and life is freed, Christ is Risen and the tomb is emptied of the dead: for Christ and life is freed, for Christ, being raised from the dead, has become the Leader and Reviver of those who had fallen asleep. To Him be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen.
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A requiem is not a Mass for the Dead
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Posted:Mar 23, 2008 7:59 am
Last Updated:Mar 25, 2008 9:41 am 4079 Views
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He is Risen! Halleluian!
Today we do not say a Mass for the death of Jesus. But rather, a requiem is a plea for our own resurrection.Let us never forget that while Jesus accomplished the impossible-- rising from the dead, it remains our own life time goal to reach salvation. Let us Praise God today for the resurrection of Jesus and plea to God for our own!
Halleluian. He is indeed Risen from the dead!
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Put your eggs into one basket.... my predictions for the tough times ahead
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Posted:Mar 22, 2008 9:35 am
Last Updated:Mar 25, 2008 9:37 am 4237 Views
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Many people are worried these days about future times. They have good reason to do so. Foreign policies that exhibit first strike attacks on other countries as an option will make anyone jittery. We are facing some very tough times ahead because the world is teetering.
For far too long, many poor nations have suffered in silence while we in the more developed countries have wasted our energy, our water, our food and our time watching trivial nonsense on t.v. and done nothing to alleviate their hardships. Now-- many of these same nations are using violence as an option. Bad choice. Many places of impoverishment are being taken over by militants who have no concept of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Very sad.
China has emerged -- in my opinion as the new superpower. Don't think so? Go check your local Princess Auto and equivalents in your own country and see everything from shovels to generators being sold with the Made in China label on them at just a fraction of the price of anything like it made in North America. For years the Chinese worked for a pittance under a brutal regime. Things have changed there now. There are countless Chinese people here in our own country who own many businesses in China making huge profits. China is now a capitalist market economy with the wealthy Chinese owning their own slaves .. not much different from before. Economically China lends money to the United States and others. They have the largest standing army in the world. Go check out the latest news from uprising these past few months in Tibet! It's a brutal regime. The Dahlai Lama is seen by the Chinese government as the cause of all the uprisings in Tibet. In fact.. he is the most peaceful man I know of. He is more like a modern Ghandi than a warrior as he is descibed by the Chinese authorities.
The United States will soon have spent over a trillion dollars on the Iraq war. A total waste of money. Bad decision, period. In the meantime many Americans cannot find work or the money to pay off their mortgages. We need concern ourselves wherever we live.. with the climate. Floods, quakes, tornados, wind storms and all the rest are now common occurances not freak acts of God. Watch out for a huge rise in your insurance rates too...They love this stuff!
I believe we are heading for an enormous depression that will make us ration everything from water to bread. We've lived too high off the hog for far too long... imbibing sports and other drugs from alcohol to cocaine to take our mind off things gone rotten.
Place not your trust in the military. It has its place for natural disasters and times when we need protection. But it has been largely abused for the wrong purpose. And the arms manufacturers depend exclusively on armies and world tensions-- otherwise they would be in bankruptcy seeking protection!
Our only hope is Jesus. Place his eggs and His alone in your basket. Our only security is Jesus Christ-- not the nonsense that goes on at airports and border crossings making fools of everyone.
Our stocks may fall. Our banks may close. But the door to Jesus is always open. We need to take care of our poor. Open our doors to helping others. Rid ourselves of the paranoia that we are about to be attacked by foreign terrorists. The more innocents we kill through our wars abroad the more we do need to fear retalliation... and heaven knows how many we have killed in the Middle East. But we need to move in a whole new direction. Move out to the stranger and invite him/her in. Offer almsgiving to the poor Muslims in our communities. Give them jobs not insults and words of scorn. Pour hot oils over the heads of our enemies by being kind and loving them rather than seeking revenge.
My friends "Love one another as I have loved you". Research these words and see from whose lips they first came. It was a revolutionary. They came from a man who injected divine ideas into a world that knew only war and terror. His followers were jailed, decapitated, tortured. But their leader gave them hope. So much hope that they travelled to the ends of the earth telling everyone about him.
Yes easter is the time to collect all our eggs and place them in the one basket of Jesus Christ... Our Lord and Saviour! OUR ONLY SECURITY IS IN HIM AND HIM ALONE!
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Continuing to pray for Mary
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Posted:Mar 21, 2008 11:56 pm
Last Updated:Mar 22, 2008 7:58 am 3811 Views
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Joanne's Mother Mary continues to progress daily.. thanks to all our prayers. I'm told Mary is doing well and responding to treatment. I wish to thank you all for your continued prayers as we again pray for Mary and her Joanne and the entire family. Cancer has no place in our world and we will not succumb to it.
The Lord will bless her and keep her strong in her fight against this disease.
Halleluiah... the risen Lord is the salvation of all of us and all the evils that prevail in our land.
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If you found the perfect box of chocolates....
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Posted:Mar 21, 2008 11:35 pm
Last Updated:Mar 22, 2008 5:02 pm 3855 Views
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If you found the perfect box of chocolates, would you share it or eat it all yourself?
God is like that box of chocolates. He's soft in the center, he's also hard on the inside. He's full of toffee, nuggats; nuts at times, and even gooey all over and tastes ohhh so good!
Does it not say in the psalms "O taste and see the goodness of the Lord?" There are times when we can take scripture literally you know!
We no longer prove God's existence with syllogisms and arguements rational or otherwise. We no longer existentialize and use metaphyisical or metaphorical analogies or anything else that attempts to make us more higher in learning than the simple God we praise and believe in.
GOD is so good that once we have tasted his goodness he just melts in our mouth! AMen my brothers and sisters who have shared their chocolates with each of us?
Please pass the chocolates! Easter is soon upon us!
Halleluiah and eat 'til your heart's content!
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