Safe Haven

I'll be gone for the weekend. Love to all. Bacon makes everything better. So does George Michael. There is in fact baseball in Heaven. And no commercials. (Aside from that "no tears" thing.) Be sure you say what matters before you lose the chance. Love means ALWAYS having to say you're sorry. Westley was right: Life is pain, but it is pain with purpose. If you go toward God, you found the purpose. I've been wrong more than I've been right. Let's not keep score, because Love wins.

Election Update: Debate Reaction--At least the president didn't lay down this time. He was more assertive. Whether that will help him is highly questionable. His whole presentation was an ad hominem that amounts to, "Romney and the Republicans hate poor people." Which, even if I were left of center, is not an affirmative argument in favor of anything. Romney was Johnny Interrupter, but it was understandable. Candy Crowley of CNN was working for the Obama campaign. I don't say that lightly. Lehrer was fine, and Raddatz was fantastic in the VP debate, I thought. Crowley corrected Romney on Libya, drawing applause from the undoubtedly liberal audience, even though she was wrong. (And to her credit, said as much after the debate.) And Romney neither got equal time, nor replies to very contentious points. Easily the worst moderated debate, ever. Watch this Libya thing; I still think at some point that it will get very ugly for the president. Reading and hearing his state...

There's just something about us, isn't there? We're capable of so much good; we can change the world with the stroke of a pen. And yet, we are capable of unspeakable evil; we can change the world with the stroke of a pen. One of the great lies we've been told is that it doesn't really matter what we do. I'm not a president, a CEO, or even a father. Who cares what I do? A succession of little choices makes a world; don't let anyone lie to you. I think I was aware today that others have it worse than me. There are lots of little meritorious struggles--and big ones--that we'll never see. But God sees. How we respond in the little tests is how to see if the mountains move. Even if today was uneventful, I wonder: Did I make the mountains move? O God, please be with Jenny and Jamie. Bring healing, and Your comforting presence. Quiet anxious hearts around them. Still their own hearts if they are troubled. I offer You my quiet, good day for their benefit. ...

Sometimes, our hearts are way ahead of The Plan. Maybe things won't even come close to what we thought. But we get stuck. Do you ever feel stuck? [Cue the Lionel.--ed.] If you want the truth, I feel like a catcher fielding a throw from center field; the ball has beaten the runner by a significant margin. The catcher knows. This is going to hurt. Of course my epic stupidity is involved. When is it not? I definitely thought I was smarter than this; I thought I was wiser. I'm not wise; I'm an idiot. Lucky for me, Jesus loves idiots and scoundrels and fools and saps. Never forget this as long as you live: God loves you more than you do. The only people in any real trouble are those who don't believe this, and, not realizing how warped their definition of "love" is, love themselves more than they love Him. Then again, that appears to encompass a great many people. What are they looking at? Jesus must feel like Ebenezer Scrooge sometimes. You know, at the begi...

My Political Philosophy, In Brief     It has been instructive and fortunate to come of age during the ascendancy of the Republican Party, a party nominally dedicated to constitutionally-limited government, free enterprise, and self-determination. I say "nominally" because most of us are aware of that party's complicity in the erosion of personal liberty and economic self-determination that brings us to this moment of crisis, this time for choosing, to borrow a phrase. Though we will choose our leaders in just days, my concern is not that choice; indeed, if we do not pause to reflect upon ourselves, the results will not matter, and we have to wrestle with the plain fact that our purposeless running about may prevent that choice from ever truly mattering again.   The protest movements that have merited comment in the last few years share affinites with, if you will, both ends of our political spectrum: one on the right, and one on the left. The Tea Party started ...