Και ιδου καλα λιαν
The last few days, since second-day, have been nearly perfect. The nights have been clear or with minimal cloud cover, and it has been around 60° when I head up to the upper yard just before twilight begins its soft painting of the horizon. It is just me, then, the night watch-bird who evidently is tasked to sound off reveille for the rest of the flocks, and the stars and moon. The sky has been glorious: A full Thunder Moon has been hanging in the southwest, with, I think, Jupiter and Neptune trailing a few degrees of arc behind it, so close to each other their light adds and they seem to be just one bright star; Mars and Venus, also close to each other, are jewels bedazzling the east.
Two days ago, an amazing conclave of the local tribe of Rusty Black birds took place. I was facing the Honey and Black Locust trees that abut my neighbor's yard, watching the wash of dawnlight drip steadily down from their crowns, when a spate of harsh “chaks” caught my attention. These are “open architecture” trees – large airy branches that allow see-through to the sky beyond – and it only took a few moments to spot two blackbirds having a chat on their veranda. Then, before I went back to Psalms, three more blackbirds flew over my head, acking and chakking along, to alight in the Honey Locust; then more flew in from different directions, in twos, threes and fours. I guess about twenty altogether settled in for the family meeting, and was it a noisy one!
They sounded, for all the world, like the Martians in that wonderfully silly sci-fi spoof, Mars Attacks:
Ack, ack, chak rack
Chak ack ack , CHAK
Rack chak chak – ACK
Ack rack chak ack chak chak chak ack rack ack ACK
I am not sure of the “rack” sound, though: I am not sure now they have an “r” sound. But I could certainly see then with my mind's eye those big-headed Martians happily disintegrating every human they came across. Ack rack rack!
The meeting lasted hardly five minutes, I guess; then, off they went, again in two, and threes, and fours, to do whatever Rusty Blackbirds do during the day. It is impossible to not think that information passed about during this meeting, or that decisions were made: “There's a dead chipmunk on Pinehurst”; “You three go see if pink-head's garbage is still uncovered”; “Do you think that putz sitting there watching us will throw out more bread today?” I think people who deny human exceptionalism are ideology-driven and will make life (human life, that is) hell on earth if they succeed in purging the concept (and truth) of human dignity from our legal systems; they will happily destroy every human they deem, with Justice Ginsberg, a member of those populations "we don't want to have too many of." Ack chak chak.
However, it is increasingly impossible to accept that the old lines that separated humans from animals are still valid. I do not know just what those Blackbirds were about, but surely their meetings are not simply noisy events. I find myself more and more inclined to vegetarianism, as I observe the birds and animals that are becoming increasingly at home in my yard, even when I am out in it.
The blackbirds certainly spurred me to action that morning, after watching them break meeting and fly off to “work.” In imitation, I finished the 50th Psalm, resolved to keep his statutes before me, and picked the day's salad: My Kentucky Wonders are finally fruiting, and soon I will have long and fat pods to eat regularly. Later that day, I cropped my second harvest of chamomile and hung it to dry; I cropped some sage and basil, too. The days have been perfect for drying: hot, with the gentlest of breezes to fan the hanging herbs in the shade of the porch. My cayenne plants are flowering, and soon my cherry tomatoes will be turning.
And it was exceedingly good.
10.7.09
22.6.09
Woolman redux
Of course, I am not even close, as any Conservative List Friend will say. Maybe redivivus is closer, in its connotation of "second-hand," but even that is a loose fit. I am making the effort, however.
There is a marvelous passage in Thomas P. Slaughter's The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition that ties his writing to his tailoring. It is not a hard seam to construct in one's mind, if one has done any sewing at all, especially by hand. There is something about the process that conduces rumination, and is easy to imagine Woolman "writing" and "editing" passages as he sewed.
Fortuitously (at least, so far), the morning after I returned the book to the meetinghouse library, I was forced to admit that my favorite shirt - a collarless, loose-fitting, longsleeve cotton one that wore like a whisper - was beyond mending. It could not even make it out of the washing machine that morning without ripping. So, I set to with a carpet blade on the stitching and turned it into a template for a new one. I am a tyro tailor!
Orthodox Hesychasts have typically recited the Jesus Prayer in a rhythm tied to their breathing, just like some Buddhist practice. I have adapted the Prayer to my sewing, and it is turning out to be a fruitful adventure. I have to admit, though, I am still experiencing some minor problems maintaining a prayerful attitude.
"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of... Ow! ... have mercy on me... son a bitch that hurt! (having just jabbed the needle under my nail)... a sinner."
There is a marvelous passage in Thomas P. Slaughter's The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition that ties his writing to his tailoring. It is not a hard seam to construct in one's mind, if one has done any sewing at all, especially by hand. There is something about the process that conduces rumination, and is easy to imagine Woolman "writing" and "editing" passages as he sewed.
Fortuitously (at least, so far), the morning after I returned the book to the meetinghouse library, I was forced to admit that my favorite shirt - a collarless, loose-fitting, longsleeve cotton one that wore like a whisper - was beyond mending. It could not even make it out of the washing machine that morning without ripping. So, I set to with a carpet blade on the stitching and turned it into a template for a new one. I am a tyro tailor!
Orthodox Hesychasts have typically recited the Jesus Prayer in a rhythm tied to their breathing, just like some Buddhist practice. I have adapted the Prayer to my sewing, and it is turning out to be a fruitful adventure. I have to admit, though, I am still experiencing some minor problems maintaining a prayerful attitude.
"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of... Ow! ... have mercy on me... son a bitch that hurt! (having just jabbed the needle under my nail)... a sinner."
18.6.09
Those birds, again
This time they prompted me to speak in Meeting on First Day.
I still sit out in the upper yard each morning to pray, experience the sunrise, and listen to the great swell of birdsong during the twilight period. I know most of the scientific hypotheses proffered to explain the reasons behind bird vocalizations, but do not doubt for a moment that in the morning, just like me, the birds are at Lauds.
After the sun had cleared the eastern horizon sufficiently for the “Great Hush” to occur, I closed my New Testament – that morning I was reading the fourth chapter of John - and turned my chair around to face west: I like to gaze, during silent prayer, at the opposite ridge as it is gradually illumined by sun as it ascends its arc to the south. Sometimes, though not on First Days, for I must leave for Meeting at 8:00, I will sit in “religious retirement” until the sun is high enough to feed my pole beans at the base of the hill with its wavelengths of life (or vivifying charges, if one is in a quantifying frame of mind); this does not happen until around 8:15, though.
Anyway, during one of the times my eyes were open and on the ridge line floating above the line of roof tops beneath me, a flicker of red caught the corner of my eye and I alerted to watch two cardinals fly north to south over my and my neighbor's backyards. The cardinals are my neighbors too, of course: They are here year round. What was special this time was the way their flight kept broaching the plane of the sunlight, a sinusoidal path with the inflection point on the interface between shadow and light. They would flash brilliant red, then dip into dullness. Their coruscating flight lasted mere seconds, then they disappeared beyond the Honey Locust trees to the south. Occasionally, this neighborhood unleashes its wonders.
Later, in meeting, the cardinals and their flight returned to my mind, flashing a message that I felt impelled to share. I do not remember, now, my exact words: I do remember thinking, churlishly, “I never witness, why now with only two others here?” and the immediate rebuke, “How do you know that stranger is not here just for this message?” I didn't rise, but simply said what I had to say. And sure enough, the young man, new to me and perhaps a Seeker, expressed more than just perfunctory thanks to me at rise of meeting.
I offered that the cardinals' flight was a metaphor for our own journey through life, sometimes in the Light, and sometimes not; but that, while the cardinals always know perfectly well when they are flying in the sunlight, we humans have developed a host of intellectualizations and rationalizations with which to convince ourselves, when it suits our purposes, that Darkness is Light, and vice versa, and that our consciences are often malformed. I added that the Light of Christ Within, however, could illumine even a malformed conscience, if one cared to look; and that there were, in addition, others about us who walk in the Light and who could see perfectly well where we are with respect to It, even when we are fooling ourselves.
I was not quite this succinct in Meeting, but not terribly fumbling with my words. The whole thing came upon me quickly, and it certainly seems a true enough message. I lapsed silent, at ease, and thanking the cardinals and their Maker.
I still sit out in the upper yard each morning to pray, experience the sunrise, and listen to the great swell of birdsong during the twilight period. I know most of the scientific hypotheses proffered to explain the reasons behind bird vocalizations, but do not doubt for a moment that in the morning, just like me, the birds are at Lauds.
After the sun had cleared the eastern horizon sufficiently for the “Great Hush” to occur, I closed my New Testament – that morning I was reading the fourth chapter of John - and turned my chair around to face west: I like to gaze, during silent prayer, at the opposite ridge as it is gradually illumined by sun as it ascends its arc to the south. Sometimes, though not on First Days, for I must leave for Meeting at 8:00, I will sit in “religious retirement” until the sun is high enough to feed my pole beans at the base of the hill with its wavelengths of life (or vivifying charges, if one is in a quantifying frame of mind); this does not happen until around 8:15, though.
Anyway, during one of the times my eyes were open and on the ridge line floating above the line of roof tops beneath me, a flicker of red caught the corner of my eye and I alerted to watch two cardinals fly north to south over my and my neighbor's backyards. The cardinals are my neighbors too, of course: They are here year round. What was special this time was the way their flight kept broaching the plane of the sunlight, a sinusoidal path with the inflection point on the interface between shadow and light. They would flash brilliant red, then dip into dullness. Their coruscating flight lasted mere seconds, then they disappeared beyond the Honey Locust trees to the south. Occasionally, this neighborhood unleashes its wonders.
Later, in meeting, the cardinals and their flight returned to my mind, flashing a message that I felt impelled to share. I do not remember, now, my exact words: I do remember thinking, churlishly, “I never witness, why now with only two others here?” and the immediate rebuke, “How do you know that stranger is not here just for this message?” I didn't rise, but simply said what I had to say. And sure enough, the young man, new to me and perhaps a Seeker, expressed more than just perfunctory thanks to me at rise of meeting.
I offered that the cardinals' flight was a metaphor for our own journey through life, sometimes in the Light, and sometimes not; but that, while the cardinals always know perfectly well when they are flying in the sunlight, we humans have developed a host of intellectualizations and rationalizations with which to convince ourselves, when it suits our purposes, that Darkness is Light, and vice versa, and that our consciences are often malformed. I added that the Light of Christ Within, however, could illumine even a malformed conscience, if one cared to look; and that there were, in addition, others about us who walk in the Light and who could see perfectly well where we are with respect to It, even when we are fooling ourselves.
I was not quite this succinct in Meeting, but not terribly fumbling with my words. The whole thing came upon me quickly, and it certainly seems a true enough message. I lapsed silent, at ease, and thanking the cardinals and their Maker.
3.6.09
Hannah Talyor
Yet I am sensible that I do not love him as I ought, nor as I desire to love him; therefore, O my King!, increase my love, my faith, and my obedience; and never suffer me to disobey Thy pure law written in my own imperfect heart. Preserve me in the valley of deep humiliation, into which I see I must further descend. Ah! Thy own beloved Son, my dear Redeemer, walked in it; then why should I not recoil at the humbling prospect before me. O Lord! make of me what Thou wilt, only I beg of thee, grant me Thy enlightening presence.
So wrote Hannah Taylor, in the 4th month of 1799. She was just twenty-four. The Memoir, published in York, in 1820, begins maddeningly: It severely edits the portion of her manuscript in which she covers the period of her life prior to the beginning of her journal. It jumps from
I had now the prospect of being more happy than I had been at any time of my life; for we lived in an agreeable part of town, had a sweet engaging child, and a plentiful income; but, how soon human prospects vanish, will be seen in the following relation.
to,
Oh! the sorrowful days and wearisome nights that I passed for months together, yet I had not anyone to whom I thought it best to open my mind, but the Lord alone; who only knew the bitterness of my grief, and who often consoled me, for having done my duty, and encouraged me to do so through all, though no easy task.
It does this with a bracketed explanation:
Some occurrences of a particularly afflicting nature are here adverted to by the writer, but it may suffice to say, that her domestic comforts were thereby broken up, and, which greatly added to her other deep trials, she was deprived, by death, of her beloved only child, who, as she expresses it, “Had been her greatest comfort for some months.”
We quickly find ourselves in 1st month, 1799 with her child dead, herself homeless and on the way live with her sister in Ireland, and with her husband and his family seemingly vanished from the earth. What warranted this redaction? Did she write a few unseemly words about the destruction of her happiness? Or did the editors feel her recounting of the events bespoke falseness on her part? Well, I like Hannah, so far, and suspect this is just another example of Quaker editors making sure the approved Quaker image made it into print. Given the way Ellwood and Fell bowdlerized Fox's journal, it is not hard to suspect it here.
6th Month, 2d. Favored this evening with a small feeling of heavenly love, which is very welcome after long desertion. O! may this sweet consolating balm be thankfully received, and my poor feeble mind encouraged to war against the world, the flesh, and the devil, by the overcoming power of my dear Redeemer. O! withhold it not from me, my Lord! and my King! for I can do no good thing without a portion of it.
14th. Nothing particular as to the outward; but sighing and inner lamentation, through fear, that there is not a growing in grace, nor any sense of drawing nearer to the kingdom than when I first believed; but on the contrary, being overcome with some things, which I thought I detested. O! for heavenly aid, for that alone can do all for and in us, when strictly attended to.
18th. More quietness and peace, with desires for improvement and good, and forgiveness of past omissions and commissions.
Still tried about an outward home, yet thanks be to my dear Lord and Comforter, I have not been left entirely without his presence, nor without a hope that I shall not be entirely forsaken, if I put my trust in Him, which I ardently wish to do; and to love Him with all my heart, with all my mind, and with all my strength, both now, and to the end of my life. Amen!
I really like Hannah. I like all these old Friends, for even the elderly ones writing near the end of life knew fear and trembling and dark nights of the soul. How different from so many “moderns” I know who do not hesitate to proclaim that they are perfectly ready to stand before God right now, this instant, to justify whatever their moralité du jour might be, no matter how in conflict it is with Scripture or Christian tradition. Apparently, they imagine there is an appeals process set up for the goats; certainly, they have no use for the First Beatitude, the first step on the path to theosis.
So wrote Hannah Taylor, in the 4th month of 1799. She was just twenty-four. The Memoir, published in York, in 1820, begins maddeningly: It severely edits the portion of her manuscript in which she covers the period of her life prior to the beginning of her journal. It jumps from
I had now the prospect of being more happy than I had been at any time of my life; for we lived in an agreeable part of town, had a sweet engaging child, and a plentiful income; but, how soon human prospects vanish, will be seen in the following relation.
to,
Oh! the sorrowful days and wearisome nights that I passed for months together, yet I had not anyone to whom I thought it best to open my mind, but the Lord alone; who only knew the bitterness of my grief, and who often consoled me, for having done my duty, and encouraged me to do so through all, though no easy task.
It does this with a bracketed explanation:
Some occurrences of a particularly afflicting nature are here adverted to by the writer, but it may suffice to say, that her domestic comforts were thereby broken up, and, which greatly added to her other deep trials, she was deprived, by death, of her beloved only child, who, as she expresses it, “Had been her greatest comfort for some months.”
We quickly find ourselves in 1st month, 1799 with her child dead, herself homeless and on the way live with her sister in Ireland, and with her husband and his family seemingly vanished from the earth. What warranted this redaction? Did she write a few unseemly words about the destruction of her happiness? Or did the editors feel her recounting of the events bespoke falseness on her part? Well, I like Hannah, so far, and suspect this is just another example of Quaker editors making sure the approved Quaker image made it into print. Given the way Ellwood and Fell bowdlerized Fox's journal, it is not hard to suspect it here.
6th Month, 2d. Favored this evening with a small feeling of heavenly love, which is very welcome after long desertion. O! may this sweet consolating balm be thankfully received, and my poor feeble mind encouraged to war against the world, the flesh, and the devil, by the overcoming power of my dear Redeemer. O! withhold it not from me, my Lord! and my King! for I can do no good thing without a portion of it.
14th. Nothing particular as to the outward; but sighing and inner lamentation, through fear, that there is not a growing in grace, nor any sense of drawing nearer to the kingdom than when I first believed; but on the contrary, being overcome with some things, which I thought I detested. O! for heavenly aid, for that alone can do all for and in us, when strictly attended to.
18th. More quietness and peace, with desires for improvement and good, and forgiveness of past omissions and commissions.
Still tried about an outward home, yet thanks be to my dear Lord and Comforter, I have not been left entirely without his presence, nor without a hope that I shall not be entirely forsaken, if I put my trust in Him, which I ardently wish to do; and to love Him with all my heart, with all my mind, and with all my strength, both now, and to the end of my life. Amen!
I really like Hannah. I like all these old Friends, for even the elderly ones writing near the end of life knew fear and trembling and dark nights of the soul. How different from so many “moderns” I know who do not hesitate to proclaim that they are perfectly ready to stand before God right now, this instant, to justify whatever their moralité du jour might be, no matter how in conflict it is with Scripture or Christian tradition. Apparently, they imagine there is an appeals process set up for the goats; certainly, they have no use for the First Beatitude, the first step on the path to theosis.
1.6.09
George Tiller assassinated
David Bereit, National Director of 40 Days for Life, issued the following statement about the slaying of George Tiller at a Wichita, Kansas church:
"As a nationwide organization dedicated to peaceful and prayerful solutions to the crisis of abortion, 40 Days for Life is shocked and dismayed by the shooting death of Kansas abortion provider George Tiller. Such violence against a fellow human being is never justified, and 40 Days for Life condemns this senseless act. We encourage people of faith to join in prayer for all those affected by this unconscionable action."
It is hard to see this as "senseless": Tiller was a late-term abortionist - a serial killer - and proud of it; it makes perfect sense that eventually a man who lost a child to Tiller might react this way. Similarly, "shocked and dismayed" is disingenuous: Abortion is murder and pro-life activism has quite correctly pointed this out; every child murdered has a father and revenge killings have always been a possibility.
Cynical me, though, expects the assassin is in the pay of the abortion industry: There is far too much money at stake for it to sit by quietly and let public opinion turn pro-life. The timing of this, following the recent poll release, not to mention the Obama DHS document equating anti-abortion activity with domestic terrorism, could not be better for abortion advocates. 50 million children dead in this nation alone to a handful of abortionists; it is a no-brainer over which the media will make issue.
"As a nationwide organization dedicated to peaceful and prayerful solutions to the crisis of abortion, 40 Days for Life is shocked and dismayed by the shooting death of Kansas abortion provider George Tiller. Such violence against a fellow human being is never justified, and 40 Days for Life condemns this senseless act. We encourage people of faith to join in prayer for all those affected by this unconscionable action."
It is hard to see this as "senseless": Tiller was a late-term abortionist - a serial killer - and proud of it; it makes perfect sense that eventually a man who lost a child to Tiller might react this way. Similarly, "shocked and dismayed" is disingenuous: Abortion is murder and pro-life activism has quite correctly pointed this out; every child murdered has a father and revenge killings have always been a possibility.
Cynical me, though, expects the assassin is in the pay of the abortion industry: There is far too much money at stake for it to sit by quietly and let public opinion turn pro-life. The timing of this, following the recent poll release, not to mention the Obama DHS document equating anti-abortion activity with domestic terrorism, could not be better for abortion advocates. 50 million children dead in this nation alone to a handful of abortionists; it is a no-brainer over which the media will make issue.
28.4.09
Subcontracting
This morning after Lauds, a robin fluttered into the main yard near the corner of the house, where my Kentucky Runner beans are thinking about germinating. I have a watering pole - a hollow piece of an old hammock frame - sunk into the ground there for support and to provide water directly at root level; two pieces of heavy twine run from the pole to the gutters for the bean plants to climb. The robin I-spied with her little eye the loose end, at least a foot long, of one of the twine strands and fancied it suitable for her nest. She grabbed the end in her beak and flew off with it, right back into the ground.
I watched her for a couple of minutes from the upper yard. She would tug and twist her head, then try to fly off again. She flapped to the top of the watering pole, took a crap as she pondered the situation, looking down at what was clearly prime building material, and tried again. After another minute of flapping and tugging and head twisting, she retreated to the pole again. I wondered just how long it would be before she gave up.
But I didn't have the heart to let it go on; birds must feel frustration, too. Naturally, as soon as I got up she flew away. I refreshed my tea, cut the loose end free at the knot and in half, then went back to the upper yard to read. I did not expect her to return soon.
However, hardly five minutes passed before she hopped around the corner of my neighbor's house. Stealth! She was determined to have her twine, but knowing I was there, thought a ground approach prudent. She moved along the wall of the the house until I lost her behind the hedges; suddenly, she darted at the twine. I wonder if she felt any surprise at how easily she gathered the two pieces up to take home. She flew off, prize in beak; I have been smiling since. I am a subcontractor for birds.
There has been an argument waiting for me to address on the Friend's List since Sixth-day evening, but it can wait yet another day. I am not about to ruin my current bonhomie towards Creation.
I wonder if the nest has a nice view and good feng shui.
I watched her for a couple of minutes from the upper yard. She would tug and twist her head, then try to fly off again. She flapped to the top of the watering pole, took a crap as she pondered the situation, looking down at what was clearly prime building material, and tried again. After another minute of flapping and tugging and head twisting, she retreated to the pole again. I wondered just how long it would be before she gave up.
But I didn't have the heart to let it go on; birds must feel frustration, too. Naturally, as soon as I got up she flew away. I refreshed my tea, cut the loose end free at the knot and in half, then went back to the upper yard to read. I did not expect her to return soon.
However, hardly five minutes passed before she hopped around the corner of my neighbor's house. Stealth! She was determined to have her twine, but knowing I was there, thought a ground approach prudent. She moved along the wall of the the house until I lost her behind the hedges; suddenly, she darted at the twine. I wonder if she felt any surprise at how easily she gathered the two pieces up to take home. She flew off, prize in beak; I have been smiling since. I am a subcontractor for birds.
There has been an argument waiting for me to address on the Friend's List since Sixth-day evening, but it can wait yet another day. I am not about to ruin my current bonhomie towards Creation.
I wonder if the nest has a nice view and good feng shui.
24.4.09
Amazing Grace
and inexplicable happiness.
Earlier this week, I decided to give the Conservative Friends a rest from any more pro-life challenges until Monday. But two emails showed up overnight, one of which changed my mind. The LifeSiteNews update contained an article about Hillary Clinton being challenged about her admiration of the racist eugenicist Margaret Sanger, and her master's plans to force abortion upon the women of the developing world. The site manager asked that the piece be passed along, so I sent it to the List.
It did not take long for one Friend to plead, nicely in her case, that the matter be dropped. Soon, another Friend posted, threatening to leave the List if my anti-abortion activism continued. I answered that to be silent about evil was to be complicit in it, quoting Martin Niemoeller, and made it clear that while I would be nicer than I have been, I would not be silent. I made it clear that they would have to kick me off the List for that to happen. I wonder if they have.
I do not know, for I logged off the Net, and have not been back until now; nor do I intend to open my Inbox until tomorrow. The other email from last night was from a dear friend, undergoing a severe trial, asking that I call her tonight. I knew this morning that I needed to prepare during the day for her; and in any case, I know who is howling on the List, and what they are saying.
And then it happened. A letter from Linda Gibbons arrived in the mail. I have been expecting it, for another friend of mine recently got one. I chuckled when I saw it, but did not consider it overly providential; then I opened it. It was her private letter to me, and 116 verses of a prayer she constructed from various books of Scripture, titled “Prayer for Israel.” She only sent the verse numbers, since the whole thing typed out is apparently eight pages long, and she is only allowed to send five pages out per letter. I will puzzle it all together this evening, as the sun sets, and before I call my friend. I am sure it will be a powerful compilation, and I cannot wait to pass it on to others.
Oh yes, the Amazing Grace: she included another pro-life printout, too. This one was a passage from one of Father Frank Pavone's books, Ending Abortion. The first paragraph reads:
“For years I have been preaching that the best way to defend our right to free speech is to exercise it without fear. Ironically, the same reason that the meaningless slogan “pro-choice” sounds so meaningful to Americans is also the very reason that pro-life people can successfully convey their message – that is, we protect freedom. There is no freedom to kill. But one of the key freedoms is to express our message – any message – no matter how disagreeable it might be to those who receive it.”
I have never felt myself so clearly to be in the palm of God's hand; to be so clearly caught in the flow of Providence. I know now that whatever those Friends, whom I so deliberately made angry and unsettled, decide to do about me, what I have done needed to be done. My doubts on that matter are settled, now. Someone, I know, now sees that that Society must be pro-life officially, else it betrays its historical witness, and will start a modern witness that goes beyond that dormant “let's talk about being pro-life” website that seems to be the best they have come up with in the last thirty-six years.
And I know another thing, also. The thought came to me almost immediately with the feeling of warmth and support. I am going to end up in prison just like Linda Gibbons. I simply do not see how that is not going to happen. The Infanticide Obama's DHS has made it clear that pro-life witnesses in his nation are enemies of State, and there is simply no longer any reason to suppose that my grim joke about corresponding with Gibbons from my own prison address was not unwittingly on me.
I do not want to be a martyr; I want to be a gentleman herb-farmer: but why her and not me? But that's the weirdest thing: even now, hours after that notion came to me, I am not unhappy about it.
Earlier this week, I decided to give the Conservative Friends a rest from any more pro-life challenges until Monday. But two emails showed up overnight, one of which changed my mind. The LifeSiteNews update contained an article about Hillary Clinton being challenged about her admiration of the racist eugenicist Margaret Sanger, and her master's plans to force abortion upon the women of the developing world. The site manager asked that the piece be passed along, so I sent it to the List.
It did not take long for one Friend to plead, nicely in her case, that the matter be dropped. Soon, another Friend posted, threatening to leave the List if my anti-abortion activism continued. I answered that to be silent about evil was to be complicit in it, quoting Martin Niemoeller, and made it clear that while I would be nicer than I have been, I would not be silent. I made it clear that they would have to kick me off the List for that to happen. I wonder if they have.
I do not know, for I logged off the Net, and have not been back until now; nor do I intend to open my Inbox until tomorrow. The other email from last night was from a dear friend, undergoing a severe trial, asking that I call her tonight. I knew this morning that I needed to prepare during the day for her; and in any case, I know who is howling on the List, and what they are saying.
And then it happened. A letter from Linda Gibbons arrived in the mail. I have been expecting it, for another friend of mine recently got one. I chuckled when I saw it, but did not consider it overly providential; then I opened it. It was her private letter to me, and 116 verses of a prayer she constructed from various books of Scripture, titled “Prayer for Israel.” She only sent the verse numbers, since the whole thing typed out is apparently eight pages long, and she is only allowed to send five pages out per letter. I will puzzle it all together this evening, as the sun sets, and before I call my friend. I am sure it will be a powerful compilation, and I cannot wait to pass it on to others.
Oh yes, the Amazing Grace: she included another pro-life printout, too. This one was a passage from one of Father Frank Pavone's books, Ending Abortion. The first paragraph reads:
“For years I have been preaching that the best way to defend our right to free speech is to exercise it without fear. Ironically, the same reason that the meaningless slogan “pro-choice” sounds so meaningful to Americans is also the very reason that pro-life people can successfully convey their message – that is, we protect freedom. There is no freedom to kill. But one of the key freedoms is to express our message – any message – no matter how disagreeable it might be to those who receive it.”
I have never felt myself so clearly to be in the palm of God's hand; to be so clearly caught in the flow of Providence. I know now that whatever those Friends, whom I so deliberately made angry and unsettled, decide to do about me, what I have done needed to be done. My doubts on that matter are settled, now. Someone, I know, now sees that that Society must be pro-life officially, else it betrays its historical witness, and will start a modern witness that goes beyond that dormant “let's talk about being pro-life” website that seems to be the best they have come up with in the last thirty-six years.
And I know another thing, also. The thought came to me almost immediately with the feeling of warmth and support. I am going to end up in prison just like Linda Gibbons. I simply do not see how that is not going to happen. The Infanticide Obama's DHS has made it clear that pro-life witnesses in his nation are enemies of State, and there is simply no longer any reason to suppose that my grim joke about corresponding with Gibbons from my own prison address was not unwittingly on me.
I do not want to be a martyr; I want to be a gentleman herb-farmer: but why her and not me? But that's the weirdest thing: even now, hours after that notion came to me, I am not unhappy about it.
8.4.09
Retrogression
http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/tears_for_middle_pleistocene_human_cranium_14/
Good thing this little one was not born is in these enlightened times.
Good thing this little one was not born is in these enlightened times.
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