There is a gift in the crazy sad sickness of the world in these days.

Contrasted against the background of a culture gone crazy through its self inflicted illnesses the light of Christ shines brighter still. If we, you, me, I, are going to make it through we’re going to need to see that light and head for it as best we can through the night.

We in the Orthodox Church have our work cut out for us. Perhaps after a century or so of dithering around now would be a good time to get our act, and our jurisdictions, together so we can try to help a world where a former night club singer turned religious leader can call a guy from Chicago the “Messiah” and have people actually believe it?

Or am I just engaged in wishful thinking?

I received my statement from Ameriprise yesterday. It looks like the one account I have with them lost over $4000 so far this year. It’s what happens when you’re still a younger worker and have a higher risk portfolio based on extra time to recoup losses and although I know this in my brain I still have a hard time looking at that piece of paper.

I had a hard time watching the debate yesterday as well. It seemed like it was about two millionaires talking about how much they cared for me in the hope that I’d give them the vote they need to have me pay for their food, utilities, medical care, and an airplane for the next four years. I wasn’t impressed.

Both candidates spoke about spending more money and neither really addressed the entitlement mentality that has gripped this country. Whether its folks on Wall Street playing games with the market to use ours to get theirs or folks on Main Street looking for the Feds to do something like that for them the mentality is the same. I want mine but I don’t want to work for it, save for it, be honest for it, or think about others in my plans to get it.

Here’s something I would have liked to have heard from either of the candidates but i won’t hold my breath. “My fellow Americans. Times are tough and the first thing I plan to do after taking office is refuse my salary as President. I’m already wealthy and can afford to live with my room and board at the White House. In addition I plan to ask Congress to take a pay cut and cut staff and privileges until this crisis is over…” Then I’d like to hear something about the Federal government getting out of the mortgage business, the earmark business, the arts business, anything that’s not specifically assigned to it in the Constitution. Finally I’d like to hear about how the financial services industries will be monitored to ensure that the hard lessons we learned from the Depression of the 30’s and crashes of recent decades won’t be repeated.

Last of all I would like to hear this from either candidate. “I have come to understand that at the core of our financial problems is a matter of attitude. We’ve lived as Americans with the idea that we are entitled to ever increasing levels of wealth and financial success, that we can expect prosperity without thrift, pay without work, and reward at the expense of others. Tonight this ends. Nothing we do as a government will matter if you and I do not fundamentally change our attitude about what we consider to be our birthright, the entitlement to ever increasing wealth. We learning some hard lessons in these days about the costs of living as if tomorrow and our neighbors don’t matter and nothing will change until we personally change.”

I’m not holding my breath…

You may be surprised at the answer…

Find more here...

Perhaps the most compelling explanation for the rising divorce rates, however, comes from religious quarters. According to this viewpoint, it is the increasing secularization of American society that accounts for so many divorces. The quest for personal satisfaction and gratification is no longer considered egocentric, and self-sacrifice is increasingly seen as an anachronism, along with the religious beliefs that once informed it. Countless studies show that religious practice strengthens marital stability, while others indicate that a loss of religious belief can weaken marriage beyond repair. Moreover, a team of sociologists at Nassau Community College found that children are more likely to lose their faith following a divorce than they were before, which means that divorce itself can be the cause of the unbelief that leads to further divorce.

In a prior post I talked about Sen. Biden’s eyes looking “spooky” and I, apparently, wasn’t the only one.

I can’t tell you if the Senator had botox or some sort of lift and for the most part I don’t really care. I just find it very puzzling that in this culture we have people who seem to be willing to basically disfigure themselves for the illusion of looking “younger”. I envision one day we’ll be able to know who’s old not by the wrinkles but rather by the artificially tightened look of their faces.

I guess, at least, it’ll save the undertaker some work. Sigh!

A sample below the rest of it here…

No matter how hard they try to protect the gospel from corruption, ministers who focus on politics and politicians as a means of redemption must minimize their ultimate calling and message. The road to redemption does not run through Washington, D.C. Politicians can’t redeem themselves from the temptations of Washington. What makes anyone think they can redeem the rest of us?

Yesterday, my homily focused on how the surest way to change the sickness of our society lies not in electing a man who couldn’t change his own city or one who has been in the center of governing for years but rather for us to simply be Christians. If you’re tired of all this, be as Jesus says “Light, salt, and yeast”, in this dark culture. If you’re looking for meaning follow Him. If you’re overworked and stressed out by it all, take on His yoke, an easy and light thing compared to the weight of a sinful world.

Words of wisdom from a Bulgarian banker turned Orthodox monk.

Find it here and pass it on.



Hat tip to Paradosis

I was planning on going to bed early tonight to start making up for all sleep I somehow can’t get but I decided to stay up and watch the vice presidential debates. I chose Fox but also switched to CNN for the post debate wrap ups.

Right away you need to know that I’m not crazy about these “debates”. I’m not convinced they’re debates at all but rather question and answer sessions where, more often than not, the emphasis is on answers and not questions. “Senator Smith what do you think about energy policy?” “Well, thank you for asking, as I’ve said before we need to provide health care for every American…” And I think, as well, that most people watch them like they watch car races, that is they put up with the going around in circles in the hope they may witness a crash.

But I did notice a couple of things. Sen. Biden has spooky eyes. I don’t know who did his makeup but when he looked at the camera he often looked like the grumpy old man who used to live down the street and yell at kids when they came on his lawn. I know he didn’t intend that but it was the first thing I picked up on. And Gov. Palin came awful close, at times, to sounding like “church lady” from the old Saturday Night Live. Again, I don’t think she was trying but it did come out that way.

I thought Sen. Biden was at his best when he spoke of the loss of his wife in the automobile accident. It was a very human moment and for me I wish we would get to see more of the person behind the persona in these debates so we can make a better choice. I thought Gov. Palin showed that she was up to the job. She didn’t obviously have the broad depth of detail in her responses that comes with being in the Senate for decades but she did evoke confidence and the sense that she could quickly fill in the gaps. For a person who has been mercilessly hatcheted by the mainstream press in a way that would and never have happened for Sens. Obama and Biden it was a positive opportunity to present herself unedited and without National Enquirer type filters.

The problem for me in surveying these debates is that I don’t fit in a single category. I’m sure those on the Left will say Sen. Biden won and those on the Right will give the nod to Gov. Palin. But in rough terms I’m a social conservative and a fiscal liberal. I believe in traditional faith, traditional values, and traditional culture and as part of that I see the need for the power of the state to be used, at times, to assist the poor, protect the environment, and use its wealth for the common good. I believe in neither the hyper or the laisze faire state. I believe that personal morality and decency is what keeps us from tyranny or anarchy. I’m pro life but i know it means more then just being against the injustice of abortion. I sometimes think the Democrat party has abandoned me on the fronts of faith and morality and the Republican party on the questions of the larger social contract.

In the past I’ve used the issue of abortion as a kind of litmus test in the belief that a person who supports the fundamental right to life can, at least, be drawn to better things based on that understanding but a person who believes that the State and not God is the source of human rights (and this is a core of the abortion argument) has the potential to do great harm. I’ve also looked at how they would appoint judges because I believe in the current political climate the freedom to practice my faith can be changed in an instant depending on who sits on any given court. So I sit back and digest it all knowing that one person will never fit all my criteria and they and I will be making imperfect choices.

Having said all that I will go to bed. I know which of the two human beings I will be voting for and the debate didn’t reverse that choice. But I’m glad for the fact that we still have the right to debate and make the choice.

I pray I make a good one.

If anything about these past weeks and months, the political stuff, the financial issues, makes sense it would be found in the still, small, voice of God behind the fury of the storm.

“Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest…” When you and I are done placing all our hopes and labors into politicians, the market, our careers, our dreams, or whatever else is taking up our time there is God, still waiting and watching for his prodigal children to discover again that true rest is found not in the transitory things of the world but in the quiet peace of the Father’s house.

When Christians, who have for so long bought into the empty promises of the world they are basically indistinguishable from it, rediscover this the real revolution will begin.