It's All Over but the Counting

If you haven't done so yet . . . Get out there and VOTE!!

CELEBRATE!!

HAPPY 100th Birthday Papa Luciani!

Words to the Wise ...

... From the Stupid.

Never...I repeat...NEVER place your hand anywhere near the burners on an electric stove, even if they appear to be turned off. I did last week and learned the painful lesson that a burner on "low" does not turn red, so it looks like it's off. It wasn't. The result was four fingers with second degree burns. I will never trust the burners on my stove again. In fact, I may never go anywhere near my stove again!

Burner on "OFF"

Burner on "LOW"

Result of not knowing the difference

Is Originality an Endangered Species?

I just read a fantastic article about a new movie: Cloud Atlas. In the article the writer discusses originality and creativeness in the lively arts and how almost everything out there today on TV, in the movies and the theater is all remakes or reworkings of old shows. It's a great piece and I wanted to share it with anyone who visits my site.

Here's the link:

http://m.ign.com/articles/2012/09/17/opinion-the-price-of-originality

Strangely enough the article appeared in a weekly newsletter I receive from a video gaming site. I guess video games are really the most original form of art around now a days when you think about it.

Separating the Goats From the Sheep

There was a major brew-ha-ha this weekend over a video that surfaced on Mother Jones of Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney at a May 17^th fundraiser in Boca Raton, Florida,  stating that, “There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. There are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it." He also stated that his role as President would be "not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

May I be so bold as to remind Mr. Romney that by sending jobs overseas and giving tax breaks to companies that did so the Government is responsible for many of that 47 percent of people loosing their jobs? That once those jobs were gone it became harder and harder to find new ones? That as a result, homes were foreclosed upon, people were put out in the streets? These people ARE the responsibility of the government that put them in these precarious situations.

Look, I’m no bleeding heart for those who abuse the system, and do anything they can to stay on Welfare or Disability when they really don’t deserve it. But there are many…MANY…who do deserve it because Republican votes have done away with jobs that they thought were safe, and in so doing placed middleclass families in to the lower-middle and lower-classes. (And YES, there is a class system in America. And the only class the Republicans care about is the Upper Class.)

As the Republican Party, and I’m sure Mr. Romney, consider themselves such good, Christian folks, and are quick to quote the Bible in their rhetoric, allow me to quote the Bible back at them:

 

35‘For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; 36 naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’ 37“Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? 38‘And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? 39‘When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ 40“The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.”

In case the Republicans or Mr. Romney can’t remember where this comes from in the Bible it is Matthew 25: 35-40, right after the part that goes:

“All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.”

 

With all due respect, I think Mr. Romney and his party will be grouped with the goats.

An Honor

This past spring I made a life-changing decision: I left the Catholic Church that I had been raised and schooled in all of my life and became a Protestant, a Presbyterian to be exact. It was the wisest thing I have ever done.

My best friend always used to tell me that I was the “most Protestant Catholic” she had eve met. By that she meant that I was not big on saints, relics, man-made commandments that were supposed to supplement God’s original twelve, the Rosary, transubstantiation, confession, or a lot of the other trappings of the Catholic faith. The only thing that I cared about or believed in was Jesus, the Father and the Spirit…God in other words.

It was not until I began teaching religious education at my parish that I realized just how right my friend was and just how wrong I was to be a Catholic, let alone be trying to teach Catholicism to fifth graders. I realized that I wasn’t really teaching them Catholicism…I was teaching them about God, about having a real relationship with God by following the example of Christ, and seeing the Spirit not only within others but within themselves. To look upon all people with the realization that saints are not just special people the Church decides to elevate to some higher standard, but that all people including themselves were saints because they believed in Jesus and followed his teachings. This was pretty unorthodox teaching for a fifth grade CCD class…and while the kids thought I was “awesome” I don’t think the hierarchy of the church would have agreed.

I tried, desperately, to teach “the party line”…but just couldn’t. I finally resigned from the teaching and did great deal of soul searching. I read about different Protestant denominations and decided that the one that seemed to match my mindset was the Presbyterian Church. There was no hierarchy; the people ran the church through a governing body called The Session. There was no teaching that only men could be ministers of the Gospel, in fact, the pastor of the congregation I decided to join was a woman! And so, after attending several services, I approached the pastor and asked how one went about converting.

The answer was simple: keep attending services, taking part in the fellowship hour after services each Sunday and talking to the members. This was the best way to learn about what they believed and why. And so I did this for several more weeks. Finally, I went to the pastor and said I had decided to convert and become a member of her congregation.

Several weeks after that, I was voted into the congregation by the Session, and stood beside my best friend to profess my faith and be welcomed into the community.

That was back in March. Since then I have joined the choir, taught vacation bible school, hosted the fellowship hour and was invited to join the Christian Education Committee. I’ve been more active in this church in six months than I ever was in the Catholic Church in almost sixty years! Not because I didn’t want to be active, but because there were only certain things a woman could do in the Catholic Church. Here I’ve had no such limitations.

Now I have been nominated to become a member of the Session. I would b taking the place of a member who had to drop out due to personal matters and will be finishing out her term for the next year. I never expected to be offered such an honor in such a short space of time. It’s truly a miracle in my mind and I am so very grateful to the Lord for guiding my steps to this new life.

September 11, 2001

All that remained standing.

I'll never forget that morning. I was walking to my office building on Fifth Avenue admiring the beautiful autumnal weather and how blue the sky was. I even thought to myslef how nice the World Trdae Center looked shinning against that gorgeous blue sky. Between the time I entered the building and took the elevator to the 20th floor the first plane had hit. A few minutes later the second. We then received word that a plane had hit the Pentagon...We all knew these were not accidents. My thoughts were on my best friend's family, who were in Washington, DC to tour the White House that day...What if that was a target? Thankfully, the plane that most likely was headed for the White House was taken out by the very brave souls aboard who over came the terrorists and brought the plane to a crash landing in Pennsylvania. I remember them this day, and all the brave firefighters, police and emergency personnel who lost their lives trying to save others. And finally I remember the asssociates and clients I had spoken with for so many years who lost their lives that terrible day. I remember the families of all who were lost and pray that they can find some kind of peace. And I pray for a world where hate becomes a thing of the past and horrors like this are only read about in history books.

Autum Memory

Pope John Paul I
Elected 9/26/1978




 

 

As the leaves do turn
Orange, red and yellow  hues
I remember you

http://www.jpicentenary.org/