Opus 2022-172: Headlines: What’s for Dinner?

One of the headlines a few days ago was about a Norwegian feminist who has been threatened with jail for saying men can’t be lesbians.   We have also been hearing about some liberal who retweeted a joke that was off-color, but even worse was not politically correct and approved by the commissars.  He has been put on leave for a month without pay if my memory serves me correctly.  Then another liberal who made a fuss because he was not punished enough was fired.  What we are seeing is the left eating its own.

This is just the beginning.  If you have read anything about the Russian Revolution and the take over of the Bolsheviks then you have read about how they had waves of executions.  They killed a lot of peasants and people who were standing on the wrong corner when they needed to arrest someone but they also made it a habit of executing last week’s heros.  It is what they do.  As the disciples of Stalin strengthen their grip on American culture you can expect to see more of it.

Before you get to excited remember that the Norwegian is just an hors d’oeuvre.  The hack journalists are just side dishes. We are the main course.  Keep in mind that they will be coming for us.  They don’t really care if anyone is guilty of anything or not.  They don’t have a quota in mind.  The purpose of it will be political terrorism.  They want to cripple us with fear.  They want to condition us to be always looking over our shoulder or going for a walk in the park if we want to talk politics.  

If you are a Christian then start reminding yourself that you are on God’s side.  Usually He will shelter us from the worst but when He allows us to suffer He will also be there to hold us up.  If you are not a believer then look deep down inside and find a foundation you can stand on when the going gets tough.  It may be something like a belief in the rule of law or the Constitution.  It could be family.  It needs to be something worth suffering for and even dying for.

Stand tall and speak up.  Vote and pray.  If all you can do is think good thoughts, then think good thoughts.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-171: Playing Hard to Get

As I stated recently I have begun to read The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.  I had to do a bit of sleuthing to be able to do so.  I figured since it is a very famous work, it would be available at every library.  I began to get frustrated when I could not find it anywhere.  There is a tool that will search all of the 27 libraries in the area even if you do not have a card.  It came up empty.  I had given up and was starting to work up to a purchase when I tried one more thing.  

Instead of typing the author’s full name or the complete title I just typed in “Gulag”.  Almost instantly is showed up, all three volumes.  Amazing.  Being a trouble maker I copied the name as it appeared on the page of the library website and pasted it in the search box:  Nada.  I went to the library, pulled volume one off the shelf and went to the help desk.  “According to your computer you do not have this book.”  The librarian did all that I had done and had the same results.  She had some excuse.  I will check in a few weeks and see if the database has been repaired.  What is more likely is that they will discard the books.

This is just one of the types of things that “coincidently” seem to happen in our modern culture.  I remember going to Barnes and Noble looking for a best selling book by a conservative author.  I could not find it so I asked.  The clerk checked the computer and told me that none of the stores in the area had a copy but they had them in their central warehouse and I could get it an about a week.  Don’t you love liberals?

As I began reading The Gulag Archipelago I quickly started seeing why they would want to make this book hard to find.  Check out this from a footnote on page 13,

“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking:  What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family?  Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the down stairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?...  Or what about the Black Maria siting out there on the street with one lonely chauffeur - what if it had been driven off or its tires spiked?  The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt!”

This is not the kind of talk that Big Brother would want to get around.  No wonder the book is hard to find.

Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr I.  Translated by Thomas P. Whitney.  The Gulag Archipelago.  New York:  Harper & Row, Publishers, 1973.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-170: Who Is Next?

I have begun reading The Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn.  I keep reading quotes without any kind of page reference so I am curious what I will find.  The first 100 pages are enough that if this book were required reading in high school we would be running out of socialists quickly.  The scariest part is that I can see the Proregressives* running our administrative state are heading down this same path.  The arrest and incarceration of the January 6 citizens is a good example of what Stalin’s era would look like from the outside.  Like then we now don’t know what is going on behind the doors.

Between reading the first chapters and being in the process of reading The Brothers Karamazov I have gotten the feeling that even in the worst of times there were peasants and working people who were able to plan and work hard to achieve financial success.  The difference is that the Soviets had a religious belief, communism, that demanded that anyone being successful be destroyed.  That seems to be the goal of the Biden handlers.  At this point they are using regulation and executive orders to destroy our economy and the freedom of action that comes with it.  The big question is whether they will ever be able to move to the deluge of midnight arrests by armed thugs.  

Will Americans put up with massive arrests on trumped up charges?  I think that much of it depends on whether the elites get in a hurry or are willing to lull the population to sleep.  We see the way in which they like to arrest unarmed elderly men.  They took Roger Stone in the early hours from his home and Peter Navarro in an airport.  What would have happened in the airport if an angry crowd had surrounded the “law” and scared them spitless?  It may come to that for us.

This is also why they want to Balkanize us.  They want us divided because as long as we are “one nation under God” they will be doomed to defeat.  It brings to mind a quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin, “We must hang together or we will hang separately.”

Hang together people.  Remember that history is written by the victors and we want to be those authors.

*(Liberals, educators, the media, socialists, communists, crony capitalists, elites, Rinos, Democrats, leftists, Never Trumpers, Antifa, BLM, MSM, Deep State, etc.  Synonym for swamp dwellers)

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-169: Revisions

What if today were the fullness of time and Jesus had just been born of a virgin?  For now I don’t want to look at how He would use technology.  I want to ask myself, “How would He revise the parables to reach modern city dwellers.  Take for instance the parable that goes by different names, the seeds, soils or sower if you prefer.  How would it be reworded today if Jesus had waited to come until now.  Most of us are not familiar with farm life.  I had kids in my classes that had no idea where eggs came from.  I think He would have gotten the same points across using different word pictures.

Instead of seeds and soils producing a return He might have used different investments.  At one end the money would go to buy a bridge.  At the other end in might be time with your family.  

Perhaps we would have the parable of the Tuitions paid, Colleges attended or Major selected.  The payoff would vary from flipping burgers to living in luxury.

Perhaps He could have focused on how your favorite recipe seems to come out different every time.  Quality of ingredients, attention to detail and even clean pans could be the variables with payoff from food poisoning to robust health.

Of course it is just idle speculation.  I have a feeling that God would not ask me for my suggestions.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-168: Emerging Again

I have been finding new voices in the spiritual war that is trying to overwhelm us.  They are not something that emerged yesterday, just new to me.  If you are looking for truth and inspiration then just start looking.

Two terms have been floated around by these apologists.  The first is Progressive Christianity.  They make it clear that these people are not Christians.  They are typical liberals in the sense that they keep changing their name to protect the guilty.  This is the movement that came out as the Emergent Church.  Their leaders must have realized that a growing number of people were catching on so they came up with Progressive Christianity.  It seems like their mission in life is to infiltrate the genuine church and destroy the spiritual lives of believers.

This brings us to the second word that is being thrown around:  Deconstruction.  The way it is used is to help insecure believers deconstruct the beliefs that they had and move away from a faith in the Biblical Jesus.  I find this word so appropriate.  

I have written before about deconstructionism.  It is a real term in the world of philosophy.  It has a core principle that all things are relative.  Thus a word may mean something to you but mean something totally different to another person.  This is not just the normal problem we all have in being accurate and communicating what we think.  This is a foundational principle that the words actually don’t have a standard definition.  Now take that to the rest of your life.  There is no absolute truth.  Facts are not as important as feelings.  Reality is subject to your imagination.  The roots of this are anti-God.

This is a great philosophy for these people.  It allows them to say things to you using your own vocabulary, build up a trust because you feel they are on the same page with you and then manipulate you into spiritual disaster.  They are perfectly okay with lying by simply meaning different things than you do.  The lying comes from the fact that they know what you mean and know they are deceiving.

Be alert.  The liars are not just in the media and politics.  The sad truth is that they are also common in the church.  The only real defense is to know your Bible well enough to recognize distortions when they are laid on you.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-167: Start Simple

I start each day with worship.  That worship has various aspects:  Prayer, contemplation, Bible reading, guitar playing and whatever else moves me toward hearing the voice of God in His many manifestations.  Almost invariably God gives me a promise for the day, and that promise is good for the year and eternity.

Psalm 121 starts of with some verses that are very familiar,

(Psa 121:1-2 KJV)  A Song of degrees. I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.  My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.

Modern translations change the punctuation.  The source of help is changed to a question of where it comes from and verse 2 is the answer.

But what stood out to me recently was verse 3-4,

(Psa 121:3-4 KJV)  He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber.  Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

This is a reminder that God gives us a foundation that is not slippery.  I miss this to a degree.  I have big feet and for most of my life proper athletic shoes have been something I watch on other people’s feet.  I don’t  know what it is to bowl in proper shoes.  I always did it in my sox.  When I have played golf I have no concept of how spikes would give me more stability when I swing.  Have you ever tried to take off for first base in smooth bottomed sneakers?

It is also reassuring to know that God does not fall asleep on the job.  I can remember being on guard duty and finding it hard to stay awake.  I have driven cross country when I could not afford a motel room.  I have nodded off during less than inspiring sermons.  God is like that sensor on the front of newer cars that goes off when you pull into the garage.  It may be irritating but it saves a lot of dents.

Simple reminders make for a more productive day.  They do wonders for attitude.  I recommend starting the day with meaningful worship.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-166: When the Skinny Lady Sings

If you don’t believe that the 2020 election was stolen by illegal actions then I am wondering if there is any hope for you.  Perhaps it could be a litmus test in deciding who has the right to vote.  Maybe a constitutional amendment requiring belief in the fraud would be in order.  To be fair we need to realize how ignorant the general public really is.  Ask a middle school student what they would do about the problems in the economy and they say, “Print more money.”  I know this because I used to ask them questions like that.  

Or take something that is hard to miss if you have ever been on a beach with a clear view of the horizon or in an airplane on a cloudless day, the earth is round.  And yet Forbes tells us,

“Millennials in America sometimes get a bad reputation, this time for good reason. A recent survey found that just 66 percent of young adults aged 18 to 24 years old have ‘always believed the world is round.’"

I didn’t read the whole article.  Maybe there is some mitigating data.  I doubt it.  I could go on but I digress from my concern about our culture in the wake of the 2020 election.

I have been a part of conversations where people are beginning to believe that the only way we can defeat the cheaters is to start cheating ourselves.  I have heard it said we will never win another election unless we learn to ballot harvest, pay off poll workers and generally get involved in the perfection of the party machine that has taken place.

Personally I reject that tactic.  I understand the point.  When I have played games with people who cheat I have made sure I don’t join their games again.  When I shop in a store or buy a product that is dishonest I find other places to shop and products to buy.  I may say something but I generally walk away.  I can’t do that with my country.  

We cannot adopt their way of doing things.  If we do then we deserve to lose.  We might win a battle but we would lose the war.  We need to win the war.  If we are simply going to become Proregressive* Lite, then why bother fighting.  Join.

We need to move forward the way real Americans have always done it.  We need to stand tall.  We need to speak up.  We need to use the courts and the legal system.  Lawsuits and suing for damages goes both ways.  We need to move forward as Christians.  If you are not a Christian then at least admit you need to take the moral high road.  

We are on the side of justice, real justice, and truth.  Don’t give up until the skinny lady sings.  It may be that the fat lady will be almost starving before we get to the point of victory.

homo unius libri