Truth

1 - God is always with me. I will not fear.
2 - God is always in control. I will not doubt.
3 - God is always good. I will not despair.
4 - God is always watching. I will not falter.
5 - God is always victorious. I will not fail.
-Always True: God's 5 Promises for When Life is Hard by James MacDonald

Carolyn Arends Contemplates Her Own Death, and Yours

Carolyn Arends Contemplates Her Own Death, and Yours

Going down singing: Why we should remember that we will die.

Carolyn Arends | posted 4/18/2011 12:00AM Christianity Today

The day before he died, my father wore what his doctors called the "Star Wars mask"—a high-tech oxygen system that covered most of his face. Pneumonia made his breathing extremely labored, but that didn't keep him from chatting.

"Pardon?" my mom would ask patiently, trying to decipher his muffled sounds. Exasperated, he'd yank off the mask, bringing himself to the brink of respiratory arrest to ask about hockey trades or complain about the hospital food.

After several hours, he gave up on conversation. He started singing.

"What are you humming?" my mom asked. My dad repeatedly tried to answer through the mask before yanking it off again. "With Christ in the Vessel, I Can Smile at the Storm," he gasped. "Wow," murmured my mom, before singing it with him.

My dad learned "With Christ in the Vessel" at Camp Imadene in 1949, the summer he asked Jesus into his 8-year-old heart. Six decades later, hours before his death, that silly old camp song was still embedded in his soul and mind, and he was singing it at the top of his nearly-worn-out lungs.

I have never liked thinking about my own death. But I've considered it enough to know I hope I go down singing, or at least speaking or thinking, something about Jesus. 

I suppose that is why I found myself sobbing on an airplane while reading Margaret Guenther's The Practice of Prayer. In one section, Guenther discusses the Eastern Christian discipline of continuously repeating the Jesus Prayer: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." She reports her own efforts to incorporate the practice into her daily life, even sizing up the logs she chops for firewood by the number of Jesus Prayers she'll likely get through before they are cut.

I love the idea of having such truth-giving words ingrained into my routine. But here's Guenther's line that really got to me: "I hope that by imprinting [the Jesus Prayer] on my subconscious, it will be with me for the rest of my life, especially at the end, when other words will perhaps be lost to me."

Guenther, a former professor at General Theological Seminary in New York, is an accomplished and educated woman. Yet she is humble and practical enough to do what she can to prepare for her own death—and for the possibility that even before her death, her mind might fade into dementia. In a culture consumed with denying mortality, here is a woman who plans for it, in a way that affects the minutiae of her life now.

Remembering our own mortality helps reorder our priorities; a race toward a finish line has a different sense of urgency than a jog around the block.

Many early Christian communities encouraged believers to engage in the spiritual discipline of considering their own deaths—not in order to create morbid fear, but to put this life in the proper perspective. Memento mori, medieval monks would say to each other in the hallways. "Remember your mortality," or, more literally, "Remember you will die."

Death unaddressed is the bogeyman in the basement; it keeps us looking over our shoulders and holds us back from entering joyously into the days we are given. But death dragged out from the shadows and held up to the light of the gospel not only loses its sting, it becomes an essential reminder to wisely use the life we have.

When we remember the mortality of those around us, they become more valuable to us. Madeleine L'Engle once noted that when people die, it is the sins of omission, rather than the sins of commission, that haunt us. "If only I had called more," we lament. Remembering a loved one's death before it happens can spur us into the sort of action we won't regret later.

And remembering our own mortality helps reorder our priorities; a race toward a finish line has a different sense of purpose and urgency than a jog around the block. When a believer acknowledges that he is headed toward death (tomorrow or in 50 years), he can stop expending the tremendous energy it takes to deny his mortality and start living into his eternal destiny, here and now. And he can be intentional about investing himself in the things he wants to be with him at the end, much the way Guenther seeks to make the Jesus Prayer a permanent part of her psyche.

I don't want to romanticize death. My friend Bernie calls it "the Great Gash," and I must confess that on the six-month anniversary of my father's passing, the hole left by him is still gaping. 

But though death hurts, it is not the end. Though we mourn, we do not mourn as those who have no hope. And so I offer my dread of death to the Author of Life, asking him to help me to number my days rightly. I don't know how many I've got, but I want to use every one of them to get the truth about who Jesus is—and who I am in him—more deeply ingrained.

That's why I'm teaching my kids "With Christ in the Vessel." We sing it at the top of our lungs

Prayer

We would appreciate any prayers you can muster for Marina's Mom, Elsa, who has been diagnosed with breast cancer.  She had surgery this past Friday and is recovering well. 

Thank you.




 

Bernard Nathanson, rest in peace

"Abortion is now a monster so unimaginably gargantuan that even to think of stuffing it back into its cage ... is ludicrous beyond words," he wrote. "Yet that is our charge -- a herculean endeavour. I am one of those who helped usher in this barbaric age."

Read the full article.

Why we fight....

Those who know me, know of my involvement in the pro-life movement. Reported in the news in the last few weeks has been a case out of the US involving an abortion clinic and members of the staff who have been arrested and charged with various counts. Babies were born alive after their abortion and were murdered with scissors.

No one really wants to claim any responsibility, and we have the pro-choice movement blaming pro-lifers for what happened. Despite the fact it was they who ignored the laws regulating such clinics, and allowed the clinic to operate without any accountability.

This story, and others like it, describe what is all too-common in the abortion industry...and why it is necessary for a pro-life movement to promote a culture of life.

National Abortion Federation implicated in Gosnell case; failed to report illegalities to authorities

Posted By Jill Stanek On January 20, 2011 @ 12:59 pm

The National Abortion Federation touts itself [2] as “the professional association of abortion providers in North America.”

NAF claims to have a membership of 400 abortion mills [3]. There is a screening process [4] to join. which abortionist Kermit Gosnell attempted in November 2009, “apparently, and astonishingly, the day after Karnamaya Mongar died,” according to a Grand Jury report released on January 20, which charged Gosnell and 9 accomplices with 8 counts of murder, including Mongar’s.

Upon receiving Gosnell’s application, an unnamed NAF evaluator assessed his Philadelphia mill, Women’s Medical Society, on December 14 and 15, 2009. According to the Grand Jury report, “It was the worst abortion clinic she had ever inspected,” and NAF denied Gosnell’s application.

Although initially hiding the fact, Gosnell eventually told the inspector about Mangor’s death.

But, according to the report, the NAF inspector “just never told anyone in authority about all the horrible, dangerous things she had seen.”

I submit that more than that, the NAF inspector admitted observing profuse illegalities she never reported either, such as nonphysicians giving sedation and open defiance of Pennsylvania’s 24-hr waiting period. She also noted several unsafe practices, such as not monitoring mothers after their abortions and leaving them unattended – overnight.

I submit that along with several Pennsylvania state agencies, NAF should also face charges of some sort. Following are excerpts about NAF from the Grand Jury report:

Despite his various efforts to fool her, the evaluator from NAF readily noted that records were not properly kept, that risks were not explained, that patients were not monitored, that equipment was not available, that anesthesia was misused….

A NAF quality assurance evaluator testified before the Grand Jury. She stated that NAF’s mission is to ensure safe, legal, and acceptable abortion care, and to promote health and justice for women….

In preparation for NAF’s visit, Latosha Lewis said that Gosnell and his wife frantically cleaned the facility. The doctor bought new lounge chairs to replace the bloody ones that were there, although by February 18, 2010, they were filthy again.

Despite these efforts, the NAF review did not go well. The first thing the evaluator noted when she arrived at 3801 Lancaster Avenue was the lack of an effective security system. Although the door was locked, when she rang the bell, no one answered. Even though she could not gain entry by ringing, she was able to walk right in when a man exited the clinic. Once inside, she found that the facility was packed with so much “stuff, kind of crowded and piled all over the place,” that she couldn’t find a space to put her small overnight bag. She found the facility’s layout confusing, and was concerned that patients could not find their way around it or out of it….

Read all of it here.

Are you resolved?

Ouch.

I’ve been thinking about what I can resolve to do differently. There’s plenty I could name, but it’s the resolve that gets you, isn’t it? There’s a scene, towards the end of The Untouchables, when Jim Malone (Sean Connery), his body riddled with bullets, wheezes at Eliot Ness (Kevin Costner) through blood bubbling up from his mouth: “What are you prepared to do?”

Malone doesn’t ask Ness what he feels like doing, or what he thinks he might do. He doesn’t care about emotions, or reasoned probabilities. He’s seeking resolve. What are you prepared to do?

It’s worth asking ourselves, each of us alone, in the lonely night’s dark when bluster and delusion have left us, when the hard truths of our lives press in close as shadows. What are you prepared to do?

There’s so much I need to do, and so little I feel prepared to do, but those sad truths are neither here nor there. The question isn’t about what we aim to accomplish, so much as it is about what we strive for with everything that’s good within us.

This is liberating, if you think about it. You can’t control outcomes, after all. You can’t make your son stop drinking or your husband stop cheating or your daughter stop cutting herself. You can’t make the boys in the upstairs office give you that promotion, or guarantee that all your hard-earned savings won’t get poured down the drain by some cabal of feckless politicians, all of them blaming one another while they look to you to replenish the till.

You can’t control outcomes, but you can control your actions. You can be kind to your mother even if she no longer recognizes your face. You can pray five times a day — ten if you need to, hour by hour if you’re like me — for a temporary release from the grip of self-centeredness. You can be sure to tell each of your children every day this year that you love him. Every day. Look him in the eyes and say it.

Nothing you or I do guarantees a happy ending. The world can take everything from us like that. But each of us decides what his next step will be, and the step after that.

What are you prepared to do?

A good read.

Careful what you pray for

“You that cry out so loud for right and justice,
Do you mean justice? deed and word and thought
Judges in yourselves by one eternal measure
Of absolute and incorruptible right?
I do not think so. When you call for justice
You would make God your bailiff, to collect
Your legal dues; but not your almoner,
Still less your judge. Alas! you cannot bend
God to your service; yet He may hear prayers–
Sometimes His vengeance is a granted prayer,
When a corrupt heart gains its whole desire
And finds itself in Hell. Children, take heed,
And do not pray for justice; you might get it.”

Dorothy Sayers, “The Just Vengeance,” in Four Sacred Plays

A Franciscan benediction

May God bless you with discomfort
At easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships,
So that you may live deep within your heart.
May God bless you with anger
At injustice, oppression and exploitation of people,
So that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.
May God bless you with tears
To shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger, and war,
So that you may reach out your hand to comfort them
And turn their pain into joy.
And may God bless you with enough foolishness
To believe that you can make a difference in the world,
So that you can do what others claim cannot be done
To bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.
Amen”

A genocide by any other name....

From Anne Appelbaum’s review of Timothy Snyder’s Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin:

“As the Stanford historian Norman Naimark explains in Stalin’s Genocides, the UN’s definition of genocide was deliberately narrow: ‘Acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.’ This was because Soviet diplomats had demanded the exclusion of any reference to social, economic, and political groups. Had they left these categories in, prosecution of the USSR for the murder of aristocrats (a social group), kulaks (an economic group), or Trotskyites (a political group) would have been possible.

. . . this discussion of the proper use of the word has also been dogged by politics from the beginning. The reluctance of intellectuals on the left to condemn communism; the fact that Stalin was allied with Roosevelt and Churchill; the existence of German historians who tried to downplay the significance of the Holocaust by comparing it to Soviet crimes; all of that meant that, until recently, it was politically incorrect in the West to admit that we defeated one genocidal dictator with the help of another. Only now, with the publication of so much material from Soviet and Central European archives, has the extent of the Soviet Union’s mass murders become better known in the West. In recent years, some in the former Soviet sphere of influence—most notably in the Baltic states and Ukraine—have begun to use the word ‘genocide’ in legal documents to describe the Soviet Union’s mass killings too.”

Read the rest here.
 Via

Wow....

This is one of the new attractions to our family.  Ashton Pavel Gerk, son of David and Sharan Gerk.

His smile would just melt your heart.

Today, give me your eyes....

On not banishing the dark with a book burning

Written by Tony Woodlief

September 10, 1:09 PM 

World Magazine

There are plenty of good reasons not to burn a Quran, but I’m not hearing them in the international uproar over a Pentecostal preacher’s call for a “Burn the Quran Day.” Many people are afraid that the brouhaha will incite hardcore Muslims to react in brutal violence, as if this is distinguishable from what we normally see, as if ordinarily it’s Methodists beheading people and blowing up school buses and executing missionaries. Whatever one’s point of view about civility and respect for other religions, I’m a little tired of tiptoeing around the sensitive feelings of delusional thugs who want to burn down Western civilization in service to a bloodthirsty cult.
 

In addition to fear of Muslim brutality is the belief, by many well-meaning Christians, that the faith of Muslims should be respected, that we should have an inclusive approach to faith in God, even as we disagree on the particulars. It’s a fine line, engaging someone without affirming some deeply wrong conviction that he holds. But my sense is that too many Christians advocating interfaith dialogue are keen on any civil discussion that does not involve the very heart of the matter, the irreconcilable difference, which is that one does not reach the doorway to Heaven, which is to say Jesus Christ, by way of whatever cobbled-together directions have been attributed to Muhammad.

I think a Christian ought not burn a Quran, not because it will incite violence, not because it will disrupt communion with infidels, and not even because doing so adds the waste of a match to what is already a waste of paper. The Christian ought not burn a Quran, it seems to me, simply because destruction and negation are the purview of the devil, not God. The kingdom of Heaven is not advanced by destroying the false but by embracing the true. Darkness is never erased; it is enlightened.

In contrast, the current turmoil serves the interests of all the wrong people. A publicity-seeker gets national attention. People already harboring hatred for Christianity and America get a fresh dose of righteous indignation. Journalists get a juicy story replete with eye-rolling at the rubes who call themselves Christians. The devil could hardly have cooked up something better.

Name-Calling

Andrew Klavan

Name-Calling

“Islamophobia”: the latest charge to try to stifle legitimate debate

27 August 2010 City Journal

One of the cleverest tricks of the cultural Left is demonizing perfectly reasonable actions and opinions by giving them sinister names. It is the logical go-to technique for those whose ideas have failed in every practical application but who nonetheless still dominate the media by which ideas are spread.

A favorite example of mine is the old feminist declaration that men “objectify” women when they respond to female beauty as nature decrees. This particular reframing was not successful over the long term for the same reason that health scares involving coffee have never caught on: no one was willing to give up the stimulant. A more tenacious variation of the same approach is the accusation that law enforcement officers practice “racial profiling,” which sounds as though police center their suspicions on one race over another out of simple bigotry or meanness. In fact, if criminals of a certain type or in a certain neighborhood tend to be of a specific race, then the proper term for “racial profiling” would be “good police work.” And though, fortunately for liberals and conservatives alike, police continue to do that good work, the evil-sounding sobriquet has forced them to waste a lot of time, effort, and money pretending they don’t.

Recently, in defending an imam’s proposal to build a triumphalist “Muslim Cultural Center” near Manhattan’s Ground Zero—where, we may remember, so many innocents were slaughtered in the name of Allah—the Left has outdone itself. Rather than engage in serious debate with the vast majority of New Yorkers and Americans who oppose the project, the mosque’s defenders have simply dubbed the opposing viewpoint “Islamophobia.” As ever when this naming device is used, the left-wing media seem to rally as one. Within the space of a single week, Time put the word on its cover, Maureen Dowd accused the entire nation of it in her column, and CBS News trotted out the charge in reporting on mosque opposition.

For anyone born with the gift of laughter, the term is absurd to the point of hilarity. A phobia, after all, is an irrational fear. Given that Islam is cancerous with violence in virtually every corner of the globe, given the oppressive and exclusionary nature of many Islamic governments, given the insidious Islamist inroads against long-held freedoms in western Europe, and given those aspects of sharia that seem, to an outsider at least, to prohibit democracy, free speech, and the fair treatment of the female half of our species, those who love peace and liberty would, in fact, be irrational not to harbor at least a measure of concern.

A religion is only a system of beliefs, and to say that all beliefs deserve equal respect or acceptance is to say that ideas have no moral weight, a patent absurdity. Because the human soul thirsts so for God, the sacred principle of individual liberty demands that religion be given wide latitude when it comes to internal mind-states, modes of worship, and the description of the metaphysical. But when it comes to the practical affairs of humankind, humankind may judge—and Islam, as the world stands now, has a lot to answer for.

Whether radical Islamic violence, sexism, religious bigotry, and triumphalism are the natural outgrowths of its dogma or a series of aberrations is a perfectly valid question. Likewise the question of Islamic intentions toward Western culture in general and, by extension, the intentions of those behind the Ground Zero Mosque proposal. By what outlandish moral logic does Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf call America an “accomplice to the crime” of 9/11? From whom will he acquire the $100 million required to build his center, and what will they receive in return? None of these questions will be answered by simply condemning as phobic those who bring them to the fore.

With a hostility toward Christianity second only to Dracula’s, the Left has no credibility on the subject of freedom of religion. In a representative moment in February 2006, liberalism’s flagship paper, the New York Times, refused to publish the controversial Danish cartoons of Mohammed in order to “refrain from gratuitous assaults on religious symbols.” The next day, it famously illustrated a story on the cartoons with an offensive image of the Virgin Mary smeared with dung. One wonders, therefore: Does the Left really cherish the rights of Islam, or is theirs but a short-sighted alliance with the enemy of their enemies?

Which is to say that perhaps opponents of the mosque should question the motives of those who question their motives. In any case, they should greet the designation of Islamophobia with the derision that it deserves.

Andrew Klavan is a contributing editor to City Journal. His new thriller, The Identity Man, is due out in November from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Complete History Of The Soviet Union, Arranged To The Melody Of Tetris

Thoughts on Israel

I'm concerned.

How do I express what I see in the world?  The antisemitism that smacks of Nazism, with so few understanding and comprehending what is happening?

With no other country do we put the name of their nation and the words "right to exist" in the same sentence.

Breath of the Beast gets it:

It seems as though much of the world has the same problem with Israel and America today that Pope Urban VIII had with Galileo in 1632. Back then Galileo lost his liberty and died under house arrest. It is even more serious for Israel. But I am a little ahead of myself.

More here...very profound and disturbing.....

The Kingdom

“The Kingdom inevitably insults our sense of propriety: very simply it is filled with improper people, with improper backgrounds, with improper habits, improper manners, improper speech, and improper customs. The Kingdom bursts the wineskins of culture by embracing every tribe, race, and tongue.” Thomas Chalmers

Speaking at the BC Legislature

Well, on February 3, I travelled with my good friend John Hof to Victoria. I was a witness appearing before the "Special Committee to Review the Freedom of Information & Privacy Act".

Why you may ask? Well, censorship on the topic of abortion. In 2001, the BC Government passed a law that made one topic off-limits for those wanting information on abortion. Why? Well, I have another blog, Stop Abortion Censorship where I document the embarrassment that government experienced on this topic....the real reason they banned a subject. Sort of let's stop the debate by stopping the flow of information.

Yikes....shades of the Soviet Union!

The transcript of my talk can be read here. Of course, I'd love to debate the NDP on this topic....but....as one can guess....it's not something likely to happen....cowards.

New Year - New Decade - New Thoughts

A new year. Wow! New decade...double wow! This is the year I turn 50....only a number I know. But it does cause one to reflect...or at least it should. So I find myself asking these questions as I start the last half (wishful thinking) of my life. I am also mindful that both my grandfather and father died in their 50's.

1. What has my life accomplished? Have I done all I was supposed to do? Have I continously been in the will of God?

2. Am I today, doing what God wants me to? Is there something else or someplace else I need to be?

3. Have I been the father and husband that I need to be? Me, in all my imperfections, have learned so much over the years about relationships, Grace and the need to be there for those close to me. Have I done that? Has my life pointed the way to THE WAY? This is the hardest for me to ponder, because I am ever mindful of my screw-ups.

So, these are the thoughts that a person facing 50 ponders. Or maybe just I do....sometimes I wonder about that too....

Russian Thoughts

This Church, found on the road to Volgograd (Stalingrad) drew us again and again to its' haunting loneliness...

O Sapientia - O Wisdom

Come, O Wisdom!


December 17: Eight more days: O Sapientia (O Wisdom)

O Sapientia, quae ex ore Altissimi prodiisti,
attingens a fine usque ad finem,
fortiter suaviterque disponens omnia:
veni ad docendum nos viam prudentiae.

(translation from Fr. Britt)

O Wisdom, that proceedest from the mouth of the Most High, reaching from end to end mightily, and sweetly disposing all things, COME and teach us the way of prudence.

(another version)

Wisdom, O holy Word of God,
you govern all creation with your strong yet tender care.
Come and show your people the way to salvation.
(The circle circumscribing an equilateral triangle around the eye stands for the Godhead; the seven flames emanating are the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit - "I will ask the Father and He will send another Advocate" - the large central one at the bottom is "wisdom". But the Word is also called Wisdom.)

"Get wisdom, get understanding." [from the book of Proverbs]

But how is wisdom to be gotten?

As I mentioned in my prelude to these seven days, wonderful details have been written about these seven antiphons. But I wish to meditate on the hints they reveal about the role of Rome in Salvation History.

And, since you are most likely sitting in front of a computer as you read this, I will call your attention to that most amazing gift of Ancient Rome which sits just in front of you.

I mean the twenty-six capital letters on your keyboard, which (except for the J and the U and W) have been in use for over 2,000 years. Here they are: look at them:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

I don't have room, or the background, to explain the entire history of this most amazing gift. But we must note several points: It is not the Greek alphabet (though most of those symbols are Greek letters also!) - but there is no "chalice or great saturn" as GKC called the capital Psi and Theta, and no Omega, no Pi, no Sigma, no Gamma, no Xi... Nor are there the Aleph and Beth and Gimel and Daleth, of the Hebrew - written, moreover, from right to left.

It is a strange thing to think, too, that the Latin tongue, still in use by the Church, serves as a universal language: not only indeed for the Church, but for the Law, for Medicine, and for Science. Granted, few write their doctoral dissertations in Latin now. But so it was for well over a thousand years. And Latin is still the basis for many terms in these fields - even for ones in more distant realms, such as the hilarious "multiculturalism" which cannot but bow to Rome, and exalt her high above other civilizations!

Indeed, with the computer age, and ASCII or any other character set, this Roman gift has become even more strongly bound to the important field of communications. And communication is somehow linked with wisdom - for it reaches "from end to end"... And it was not a picture or a pictogram or hieroglyph which was to be the distinguishing symbol of Jesus the God-Man: no, it was the Word - and the word is the essence of communication.

A note: lest it seem that I slight Hebrew, may I point out the very strange truth that the Hebrew word typically has THREE consonants which form a "root" - and so the very language has a trinitarian character! Moreover, the Watson-Crick "Genetic Code" has been show to use three letters of DNA to indicate each amino acid to be built into the protein. Nor do I slight Greek, for as I said many of the Latin letters are Greek ones: but also almost as many words are still used even in this electronic and technical age! "...we have to go on using the Greek name of amber as the only name of electricity because we have no notion what is the real name or nature of electricity." [GKC, The Common Man 170]

But one more point about Latin: when I read about the martyrs of Rome, I think how they would laugh in their pain if they would be able to see the characters and language of their persecutors preserved primarily by the Church! Indeed, not just the city (where the Vatican is, and all those churches built on top of or inside pagan temples) and the Roman garments (which the priest wears to offer Holy Mass) but the very tongue of the Romans is now the martyrs' spoils of victory!

"Until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter, not the smallest part of a letter, will pass away..."

"The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us."

Come O Wisdom.

Campaign on the go....

I'm spending my spare time (haha) on a campaign to see censorship on the topic of abortion, ended in my lifetime.

It includes a blog, Stop Abortion Censorship, a Facebook group and even Twitter.

I've already been approached by a pro-life group in the US for assistance on some of their social media campaigns.

But for now, since the ban on abortion-related data was put in place largely to stop my work at the time, I will continue to find a way to expose the dark and hidden secrets that government in BC does not want us to know!

I Remember those who have left the Way....

A song that is truly inspiring.... and tells the small story that often plays out in my own life...



Beautiful Ending

Oh, tragedy
Has taken so many
Love lost cause they all
Forgot who You were
And it scares me to think
That I would choose
My life over You
My selfish heart
Divides me from You
It tears us apart

So tell me
What is our ending?
Will it be beautiful
So beautiful?

Oh, why do I
Let myself let go
Of hands that painted the stars
And hold tears that fall?
And the pride of my heart
Makes me forget
It's not me but You
Who makes the heart beat
I'm lost without You
And dying from me

[ BarlowGirl Lyrics are found on www.songlyrics.com ]
So tell me
What is our ending?
Will it be beautiful
So beautiful?
Will my life
Find me by Your side?
Your love is beautiful
So beautiful

At the end of it all
I wanna be in Your arms
At the end of it all
I wanna be in Your arms
At the end of it all
I wanna be in Your arms
At the end of it all
I wanna be in Your arms

So tell me
What is our ending?
Will it be beautiful
So beautiful?
Will my life
Find me by Your side?
Your love is beautiful
So beautiful

Through The Red Gate Documentary: Official Site – Watch The Documentary Online

Through The Red Gate Documentary: Official Site – Watch The Documentary Online

By Your Side

Tenth Avenue North widget by 6L &

Thoughts

I am forever annoyed at my fellow Christians who smugly judge people who have fallen. I know I have done it myself, directed to those I was close to...which makes it even more annoying. God forgive us for the barriers we ourselves put up, hindering people from seeing the love of Christ!

The Perils of Safety

2009-10-11 Ron Rolheiser

I was raised to be cautious, physically and morally: "Be careful! Don't make a mistake! Be safe! Don't do anything for which you'll be sorry!" I inhaled those words, literally, through my years of childhood, my years of seminary training, and through most of my years in the priesthood.

In fact they were the last words that my father, one of the truly moral men I have known, spoke to me. He was dying of cancer in a hospital and as my brother and I left for the night, not knowing that he would die before morning, he cautioned us: "Be careful!" He was referring to our driving on icy winter roads. But this caution marked his character, his moral sensitivity, and his healthy solicitude for us, his children, and it was meant morally: "Be careful! Be safe!" This was his habitual warning.

Those words are now part of my genetic make-up. You inherit more than simple biology from your father, especially if you are lucky enough to have one who was uncompromisingly moral. And that caution has served me well. I'm grateful for it. I've made it through more than half a century essentially intact, physically and morally. No small gift.

But that caution sometimes brings with it other things for which I am less grateful. One can be intact, but so cautious and timid that fear rather than love becomes the compass for one's life. The occupational hazard in always being scrupulously safe is that one can easily end up like the older brother of the prodigal son, that is, rigidly faithful in all things, but judgmental, jealous, and bitter of heart, dogmatically and morally uncompromising, while envying the amoral and being too paralyzed internally to truly dance. Sometimes a long, practiced caution in our actions makes for a heart that is more cautious than generous, more envious than affirming, and more judgmental than forgiving. Sometimes too it makes for a heart that understands love and forgiveness as things that must be merited rather than freely given and received. Too often too it results in a heart that is secretly gleeful when things go wrong for those who aren't living as we are. That isn't always the case, but it can easily be, and, speaking frankly and humbly, it has sometimes been the case in my own life.

The German poet, Goethe, once wrote: The dangers of life are many, and safety is one of those dangers. For some people perhaps the reverse warning might be more appropriate. But for those of us who were raised to be good and religious persons there is a disturbing truth in Goethe's words.

Are we living too safely? Do we have the courage to look at our inhibitions, jealousies, and religiously-sanctioned angers with real honesty? Are our lives driven more by fear than by love? Can we enter the dance without judgment and bitterness? Do others perceive us as rigid? When is the last time we could truly forgive someone who hurt us? Are our lives really about love and generosity rather than fear and self-protection?

The danger in living too safely is that sometimes when we think we are defending life we are really defending the poverty of our own lives, sometimes when we think we are defending virtue we are really defending our inhibitions and fears, and sometimes when we think we are speaking for God's healthy concern for the world we are, like the older brother of the prodigal son, really speaking of our own hidden jealousy.

The hero of the movie, Chariots of Fire, Eric Liddell, a wonderfully moral young man, was an Olympic runner who because of religious sensibilities refused to run an Olympic race on Sunday, even though he was heavily favored to win the gold medal. It would be easy to judge his action as stemming from moral and religious rigidity. In somebody else's case that might be true. It wasn't for Eric Liddell. Why? Because he wasn't driven by fear or rigidity. He was driven by love. "When I run," he famously said, "I feel God's pleasure."

Sometimes I ask myself that same question in relation to my religious and moral inhibitions: Does God take pleasure in my caution? Does God take pleasure in my sacrifices? Does God take pleasure in my anxieties about the world's moral failings? Or is the Father standing with me, outside the celebration, pleading with me, as he once pleaded with the older brother of the prodigal son, to let up a little and come inside and join the dance?

I am grateful for my upbringing, despite the congenital reticence with which it has left me. It's good to be careful. It's a responsible and loving way to live. But I am growing more honest about its dangers. I am pretty intact much of the time, but sometimes I'm more fearful than generous, more self-protective than loving, more jealous than healthily solicitous. Sometimes caution doesn't leave me with a big heart. Safety too has its dangers.

Россия

Our trip to Russia was once again a fascinating adventure. I had the honour of being present for the ribbon cutting for an Online school in Moscow. As well, got to spend some great time with our daughter Stephanie who now lives in Moscow.

We had an additional adventure when we travelled over 1000 km and visited the Volgograd area, visiting a school in the small village of Kupsovo, formerly the Volga German village of Oberdorf. In all my Russian travels, I don't think I ever left with such optimism as i did on this trip. This small school in the midst of so much poverty is a beacon of light! More later along with some photos.

Tatyana....

Updates

After a few days of up and down news, much like a roller-coaster, Natalie has been allowed to go home! Not out of the woods yet, but she is doing much better and was allowed to leave the hospital.

Baby Tatyana will remain in hospital for about another week.

Our daughter Rebecca is getting married in less than two weeks, and Steph is preparing her Russian adventure, and it looks like I'll be there a few days later for a few days.

Life is busy...interesting. Who says being a Christ Follower is boring. Life gets thrown your way...and how you handle it is the real test. As C.S Lewis once wrote:

“We're not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are
wondering how painful the best will turn out to be"

Life is precious

Made a quick trip to Calgary to see Tatyana, but also to see our daughter Natalie. Please continue to pray for her, as her kidney's and bladder are still not functioning properly....one of her kidney's is bleeding and they are trying to discover, on a long weekend, why this is happening. Taty is doing well....sleep, eat, you know the routine. It was hard to leave Natalie today.

Our first grandchild....beautiful!

This is, you realize, probably the most beautiful baby in the entire world!

More photos later....

Baby and Mom are both doing very well!

Tatyana

She's here among us! Daughter Natalie gave birth to Tatyana Ashley this afternoon at 1:45 pm, coming in at 1.8kg.

Baby is doing fine...Mom is out - do to the surgery and will wake soon to meet her little angel face to face. Dad Mike is already snapping pictures with his Blackberry.

Thanks to anyone who prayed. I can breathe again.

Nat & Baby

As I write this we are waiting word on our daughter, Natalie. Her kidney's have been progressively getting worse and has had high-blood pressure. This morning the doctors decided that they needed to deliver her baby early, so a c-section is taking place right now.

Yes, it's frustrating not being there...but I can pray. That's all I got. But it's all I know to do.

If you can spare it, could you offer up a prayer too?

Everything We Need

Everything We Need – Music and Lyric by Gord Johnson

In the morning Lord we do look to you
For the strength we need just to make it through
Have mercy
In the evening Lord we look back and say
It was in your strength that we made our way
Have mercy
You are everything we need
Feed us Lord

You're not allowed to know this....

By Paul Schratz, BC Catholic July 20, 2009

Ted Gerk is not a fan of secrecy, especially when it comes to government involvement in totalitarian behaviour.

He and his wife are of Russian heritage, and his research for a 2003 book on Soviet Catholic persecution helped reveal horrific stories of government oppression.

Hide Me Within Thy Wounds: The Persecution of the Catholic Church in the USSR, detailed the history of persecution of the Catholic Church in Russia from 1918 to its almost complete annihilation in 1939.

Now, with his cousin, Gerk is working on a book about the small village north of Stalingrad where his family originated. Their research in the archives of the former Soviet Union has produced accounts from labour camp files of his grandfather’s brothers perishing in the Gulag.

All of this helps explain why Gerk has “little patience” with governments withholding information. That, and his commitment to human life, is why he’s been such a thorn in the side of various B.C. governments.

The former president of the Pro-Life Society of B.C. has been hounding B.C. governments since the 1990s, not only opposing abortion laws, but fighting for access to abortion data that governments would prefer to keep buried.

Speaking with The B.C. Catholic, Gerk said, “The only governments that have ever tried do this are totalitarian governments.”

So in 1995 he requested a copy of the report from the province’s Criminal Harassment Unit, set up to investigate alleged persecution of abortionists and women seeking abortions after the shooting of Vancouver abortionist Dr. Garson Romalis.

B.C. Attorney General Paul Ramsay refused to release the report, but it leaked out anyway, confirming what police had said: there was no link between the pro-life movement and the shooting, and there had been no increase in any form of harassment of health-care workers and abortionists in B.C.

In 1999, Gerk requested a coroner’s investigation into live births in B.C. following mid- to late-term abortions.

His persistence led to the release of shocking information that at least several times a year, babies in B.C. were surviving abortions and living as long as six hours before dying and being issued death certificates.

Until now, Gerk’s targets have been pro-abortion NDP governments that in the 1990s introduced the abortion laws still in place today. When the NDP was ousted in 2001, many pro-lifers, including Gerk, thought there might be some change.

Instead, the Liberals have been as bound as the NDP to the unrestricted approach to abortion, and the very restricted approach to abortion information. This is despite the fact that every time abortion information has come out, there has been no evidence of increased risk to abortion staff or breaches of confidentiality, the major excuses given for secrecy.

So now Gerk says it’s “pay the piper time” for the B.C. Liberals, who were elected after the NDP made abortion secrecy an election issue.

Gerk and Campaign Life Coalition British Columbia are using B.C.’s Freedom of Information Law to show it is in the “public interest” for the Information and Privacy Commissioner to override the censorship provisions of Bill 21 and order the release of abortion-related information.

The information they’re looking for would seem completely reasonable: how many abortions are done in B.C. and where? How often do women undergo more than one abortion? How often are abortions performed on underage girls? How often do abortions result in complications?

There’s absolutely no reason that information shouldn’t be available to the public.

Their initiative deserves support, and that includes financial aid. To find out more or to contribute, visit http://stopabortioncensorship.wordpress.com or go to Facebook and search for Stop Abortion Censorship.

A Letter to our daughter Stephanie for her grad

Stephanie Grace Gerk;

Your name Stephanie means “Crowned One”, because Christ holds for you a crown of victory, waiting for you in the next world. You were named this because of the story of Stephen in the Bible. He was loyal to the Faith…and was so stubborn about it he was even willing to die for what he believed in.

Your second name, Grace, was given to you because both your Mom and I were so mindful of God’s goodness and His grace extended over our family…we felt it was important to acknowledge that Grace by giving you a name that would proclaim it to the world, and when you were dedicated, our prayer that Grace would not only be part of your name, but be an integral part of your life.

That is your calling Stephanie. Crowned one suggests royalty…a vision of who you are in Christ. Grace is the gift that God gives to each of us, and then desires that we share it and have it as our banner over the entire world.

Wherever you go, whether Russia, or another city, your duty and calling is to proclaim the gift of Grace to all that will listen. Among the many gifts, Stephanie, that God has given you are an ability to see injustice, a stubbornness to do what you have set your mind on – gifts that when allowed to be molded by God, will make you an unstoppable force for the Kingdom of God. Use your gifs wisely, for God has a destiny for you, that only you will be able to fulfill – no one else!

We leave you with these words, taken from the Message Translation of Scripture:

Proverbs 3

1-2 Good friend, don't forget all I've taught you; take
to heart my commands.
They'll help you live a long, long time,
a long life lived full and well.

3-4 Don't lose your grip on Love and Loyalty.
Tie them around your neck;
carve their initials on your heart.
Earn a reputation for living well
in God's eyes and the eyes of the people.

5-12 Trust God from the bottom of your heart;
don't try to figure out everything on your own.
Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;
he's the one who will keep you on track.
Don't assume that you know it all.
Run to God! Run from evil!
Your body will glow with health,
your very bones will vibrate with life!
Honor God with everything you own;
give him the first and the best.
Your barns will burst,
your wine vats will brim over.
But don't, dear friend, resent God's discipline;
don't sulk under his loving correction.
It's the child he loves that GOD corrects;
a father's delight is behind all this.
The Very Tree of Life

13-18 You're blessed when you meet Lady Wisdom,
when you make friends with Madame Insight.
She's worth far more than money in
the bank; her friendship is better than a big salary.
Her value exceeds all the trappings of wealth;
nothing you could wish for holds a candle to her.
With one hand she gives long life,
with the other she confers recognition.
Her manner is beautiful,
her life wonderfully complete.
She's the very Tree of Life to those who embrace her.
Hold her tight—and be blessed!

19-20 With Lady Wisdom, GOD formed Earth;
with Madame Insight, he raised Heaven.
They knew when to signal rivers and springs to the surface,
and dew to descend from the night skies.
Never Walk Away

21-26 Dear friend, guard
Clear Thinking and Common Sense with your life;
don't for a minute lose sight of them.
They'll keep your soul alive and well,
they'll keep you fit and attractive.
You'll travel safely, you'll neither tire nor trip.
You'll take afternoon naps without a worry,
you'll enjoy a good night's sleep.
No need to panic over alarms or surprises,
or predictions that doomsday's just around the corner,
Because GOD will be right there with you;
he'll keep you safe and sound.

27-29 Never walk away from someone who deserves help;
your hand is God's hand for that person.
Don't tell your neighbor "Maybe some other time"
or "Try me tomorrow" when the money's right
there in your pocket.
Don't figure ways of taking advantage of your neighbor
when he's sitting there trusting and unsuspecting.

30-32 Don't walk around with a chip on your shoulder,
always spoiling for a fight.
Don't try to be like those who
shoulder their way through life.
Why be a bully?
"Why not?" you say. Because GOD can't stand twisted souls.
It's the straightforward who get his respect.

33-35 GOD's curse blights the house of the wicked,
but he blesses the home of the
righteous.
He gives proud skeptics a cold shoulder,
but if you're down on your luck, he's right there to help.
Wise living gets rewarded with honor;
stupid living gets the booby prize.

God Bless you Stephanie…we are very very proud of you and what you have managed to accomplish! Love, Mom & Dad

Привольное (Варенбург \ Warenburg)

This snap is of the remains of the cemetery in the former Volga German village of Warenburg. I've seen many of these on my travels, but none so lonely and massive as this.

Soviets removed any grave markers and so you have row upon row of unmarked graves...I guess kinda reminding me they're all waiting for something.

As was the case for all the Volga Germans, everyone from this village was deported to Siberia in September of 1941.

A chap from Russia has visited a number of the old villages and placed his photos online, hence this fascinating and lonely photo.

On the death of the wicked

World Magazine
Written by Tony Woodlief
June 1, 8:32 AM

My wife wept when she heard that abortionist George Tiller had been murdered. She cried out and left the sanctuary of our church, perhaps for fear of hearing that God had ordained it, that it was all part of His plan. When a tidal wave kills thousands, or when a child is stricken with cancer, or even when a wicked killer is struck down with unlawful violence, it is hard to hear that this is part of God’s plan to glorify Himself, as if all this bloodshed and misery is what He intended from the beginning.

“‘Do I have any pleasure at all that the wicked should die?’ says the Lord God, ‘and not that he should turn from his ways and live’?” Perhaps more chilling, for a Bible-toting assassin, would be Christ’s promise: “For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.” Perhaps this is why George Tiller’s murderer did not stand beside his freshly fallen corpse, but fled like a coward. Perhaps as he saw firsthand what it feels like to unjustly take up the Judge’s sword, he felt the cold shadow of it cross over his own neck.

And so now a killer is dead and a murderer imprisoned and God knows how many people grief-stricken or furious or—God have mercy on their souls—exultant. A gunshot took a death merchant from the earth, but who knows what evil it has unleashed?

But worst of all, which is what grieved my wife, is that George Tiller was sent to fall before the judgment seat of God, where even a righteous man must tremble. Whatever might have been for him is ended. Perhaps he would have continued to shed the blood of innocents. Perhaps he would have repented, to the rejoicing of angels. None of that is for us to know.

We can know this, however: George Tiller was fashioned in the image of God and he was cut down by the unlawful hand of man. He is no martyr. But he is not so different from you or I. And where might we go, God have mercy on our souls, were we slaughtered in the midst of our unrepentance?

It is an awful thing indeed to slay a wicked man. Who dares claim that authority? Who aspires to sit in the judgment seat of the Living God? Better instead to pray, all of us, for ourselves and our loved ones and our enemies alike, because all of us will one day give an accounting. God have mercy on those of us who must give that accounting with bloody hands.

Remember to Vote!

Well, it's that time again. Time for eveyone to get out there and vote! We live in a democracy, and for that very reason, all of us have a responsibility to vote. Once again I'm running the web site for a couple of groups that ask some very important questions of the candidates running. That web site is located here.

See you at the polls!

The colourful life of Canada’s Johnny Appleseed

BCCN’s series of faith profiles marking the 150th anniversary of the founding of the province continues, with the story of one of the province’s more colourful missionaries. Taken from Canada: Portraits of Faith (Reel to Real), edited by Michael Clarke.

BC Christian News October 2008

By Ted Gerk

OLD-TIMERS in the Okanagan who knew him well remembered Father Charles Pandosy as a huge, powerfully built man, capable of amazing feats of strength, with a big booming voice and a ready wit.

Although a deeply religious Oblate missionary, Pandosy was also known to settle an argument by challenging his opponent to a fistfight. Today, Pandosy is best remembered as Canada’s Johnny Appleseed.

Charles John Felix Adolph Pandosy was born in Marseilles, France, in 1824 to Marguerite Josephine Marie Dallest and Etienne Charles Henry Pandosy.

His father was a navy captain and a landowner and was thus able to provide comfortable living conditions and a good education for his family It was his father’s navy career that drew Pandosy to the adventure of distant ports.

As a step in this direction, while attending the Bourbon College at Aries, France, Pandosy decided to enter the Oblate Juniorate of Lumineres, a seminary for men seeking ordination into the Oblate Order of priesthood in the Roman Catholic Church. He took his final religious vows in 1845.

Bishop de Mazenod, founder of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, provided him with an inspiring admonition: “There are in this world but two loves: the love of God extending to the contempt of self; and the love of self extending to the contempt of God. All other loves are but degrees between these two extremes. Do not fear, you obey the One who rules the world.”

This wisdom would guide Pandosy’s missionary endeavours in the Pacific Northwest for more than four decades. In February 1847, the 23 year old Pandosy and four others were sent from France to the mission fields of the Oregon Territory.

It was an arduous eight-month journey, culminating in their arrival at Fort Walla Walla. Here, the men began to fulfill the objective of their journey: the evangelization of the Yakima Indians.

Pandosy and the others quickly discovered the violence of the region. On November 29, 1847, the Marcus Whitman Massacre took place, in which several Cayuse Indians killed 13 people and took more than 40 hostages. In February 1848, American troops were dispatched, and the Cayuse War began. The war was to last two-and a half years.

Motivated by these perilous events, Pandosy’s superiors allowed for early ordination. Pandosy and a colleague officially entered the Oblate Order in early January 1848, the first priests ordained in what was to become Washington State. Pandosy altered his name at this point to Charles Marie Pandosy.

The missionaries not only cared for the spiritual needs of the natives, they also served as translators and as peacekeepers. Pandosy and his co-workers managed to keep the Yakimas from entering the war. Pandosy became fluent in the Yakima language and eventually compiled its first dictionary. He later acted as a mediator and an interpreter between the Yakimas and the white man while continuing his missionary work among the Indians and serving as an army chaplain.

In March 1859, war flared between the U.S. Army and the Spokane and Yakima Indians, and the Oblates made the difficult decision to close their missions among the Yakimas and the Cayuses.

In summer 1859, Pandosy was sent to the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia, where he established a mission known as L’Anse au Sable, the Cove of Sand, in an area that is now the City of Kelowna. Pandosy quickly recognized the agricultural potential of the Okanagan’s temperate setting and planted its first apple trees, encouraging new settlers to do the same.

A friend of Pandosy wrote: “The first trees planted by the missionary produced a beautiful apple, deep red, shaped like a Delicious – a good winter apple.” Pandosy’s orchards eventually established the Okanagan Valley as one of Canada’s chief fruit-growing areas.

Pandosy was a devout pastor who also served his flock as doctor; teacher; lawyer; orator; botanist; agriculturist; musician (he played the French horn); voice instructor; and sports coach. He fast became known as a troubleshooter, a peacemaker, a defender of justice, a champion of the underdog – and, above all else, a great humanitarian.

But Pandosy was not your typical priest. Once, when his young Indian interpreter and guide gambled away Pandosy’s brand new saddle, Pandosy immediately challenged him to a fight.

Love and respect for his priest kept the native man’s hands down by his side, causing Pandosy to grab the culprit by the scruff of the neck and demand that he put up his fists and defend himself. Pandosy, however, tripped on his cassock, allowing his opponent to jump on top of him.

Those who observed the spectacle were surprised at Pandosy’s unpriestly behaviour. Dusting himself off, Pandosy thundered: “I’m not mad at him, I’m mad about the saddle.”

Pandosy, who experienced other missions throughout British Columbia ­– Esquimalt, Fort Rupert, Fort St. James, the lower Fraser, Stuart Lake, Mission City and New Westminster – was among those who believed that Indians and their culture should be respected, and that the ways of the white man were largely responsible for the indifference that many Indians displayed toward Christianity.

He wrote to a superior in the 1850s: “But I shiver, Reverend Father, when I think of the miserable state of the Savages, as I cannot delude myself, at least in the country where we live, the Savages around us are what the Whites have made them and what we have let them become instead of working hard and generously to make them otherwise with the help of the grace of God.”

On February 6, 1891, Father Pandosy died near Penticton, after a pastoral visit during cold weather to Keremeos. His body was brought to the mission that he had founded on the site of present-day Kelowna, and lovingly laid to rest.

Pandosy influenced whites and natives alike and saved the lives of thousands during the various wars between natives and settlers. He taught that two cultures and two worlds could live together peacefully based on mutual trust and respect.

Pandosy’s life of faith and sacrifice are evidenced by the missions he founded and so diligently served. On his own behalf he said, “I expend myself and over this is spent God’s grace.”

Ted Gerk is director of operations at Heritage Christian Online School in Kelowna.

Note: This was a fun article to do for my friend Michael Clarke. We even manged to track down a little viewed updated photograph of Pandosy. Thought I would share ut with you.