Don't Forget the Meaning of the Fight

I was reading a scholarly journal today entitled "The Meaning or the Fight: Frederick Douglass and the Memory of the Fifty Fourth Massachusetts" by a scholar by the name of David W. Blight. He argued that Americans have forgotten the meaning of the blacks' involvement in the Civil War. We are surrounded by romantic notions of what happened, but even more important than remembering what happened is remembering the meaning of what happened.

The free blacks were called upon by Frederick Douglass to join the fight. Why? They were free already, weren't they?

Yes, but they had to go deeper than that. According to Blight's interpretations of Douglass's intentions, the blacks joined the fight for "self-defense through learning the 'use of arms'; self-respect by proving the manhood and courage of black people; self-involvement by controlling their own destiny and making their own history; and finally [...] retribution against slaveholders.”

It wasn't enough to be free. They had to claim their dignity--their integrity as human persons.

That's what we have to do today, as members of the Pro-Life Movement. Children are being conceived in a free country, but they are being treated as property rather than as persons. It's not enough for them to be conceived in a free country; we have to help restore to them their personhood.

Don't forget the meaning of the fight.    

Midnight Thought on Economics: I'm Fine

Ever since I started working for myself, I started to worry a lot less.
Military buildup or no buildup, I'm fine.
Low minimum wage, high minimum wage, I'm fine.
Competitive job market, or relaxed one, I'm fine.
Packed week, slow week, I'm fine.

I don't simply experience money differently just because I work for myself. 

Even if I still had a job, I'd like to think that I would still have opened myself up to my own resiliency and creativity the way I had to when I told my last boss goodbye over a year ago. 

I've learned ebb and flow. 
I roll with the punches. 
I plan for hell and high water. 
And im fine. 
And I'm getting better every minute.

Salvation is from the Jews

The fulfillment of God's promise is mind-blowing:

"It was Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac which inspired God to reciprocate, two thousand years later, with the sacrifice of His only-begotten son, born also from Abraham's seed, on yet another mount, that of Calvary.  And so we see that Abraham's utterance "God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son"(v. 8) was prophetic far beyond anything he knew, referring not only to the provision of the ram "provided" by the Lord, but referring far more profoundly to the only truly acceptable sacrifice, that of God's Son Himself on the altar of Calvary.  Jesus was the true Paschal Lamb, sacrificed on Calvary to bring us true freedom, freedom from our sins, freedom to be sons and daughters of God through participation in the sacrifice of His Son the Messiah."  

--Roy Shoeman

Catholic Jew

Midnight thought on economics: Leverage

A year ago, I promised myself that I would never apply for another minimum wage job ever again for the rest of my life.

I just listened to a podcast by a wealthy man who, as a teenager, decided to never work for a minimum wage. He cut grass instead because he knew he would get paid double of what his friends were making working at burger king.

So, I'm not crazy after all, and cleaning houses for a living has really changed my financial situation for the better.

Gives me more time and money to work on bigger things. This concept is called leverage.

More on that later.

Feelings vs Living

In the link below, Albany Rose, a post-abortive mother, says something that I find interesting.
She said pro-choicers seem to think that pro-lifers who stand and pray/advocate in front of abortion clinics make the women "choosing" to abort "feel bad." I find this interesting, because that accusation has been leveled at me--albeit in a polite manner.

I was asked to speak on the radio and invite the general populace to join a local pro-life advocacy group in a Lent-long, prayerful, silent protest in front of one of Guam's abortion clinics. I was asked to send out a news release to the different radio hosts to see who would have me on their show.

One of the radio hosts, who knew me personally, was disturbed by the goal of the news release and the topic I wished to address on the air. He was concerned that I would make people feel bad. "Please dont do this," he said.

It stumped me at first. Oh, yes, you're right. Dont want to make these poor pregnant mothers feel worse than they already do. Abortion is a "hard" choice to make. People are desperate...

But I had to snap out of it. Abortion isn't about "choice" or about whether someone's feelings might get hurt.

Abortion--legal abortion--is about legally having one's offspring killed. And that reality simply outweighs whether someone's feelings are hurt or not. It outweighs everything. If we wish to uphold the integrity of a mother, then the integrity of her child must be upheld as well. And I would hate for a woman to have to compromise her dignity by being involved, in any way, with an abortion. And if she has already suffered in that way, than I want to protect her--and another innocent child--from going through it again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNWUaZQG7RI

Abortion is Never Safe

I actually had this thought before I read the text on this photo.

I know people who believe in the "rare and safe abortion" myth. Even a part of me thought, "Well, sure, it's safer, if the doctor uses sterilized medical tools and chops up the child carefully without perforating the uterus." 

But then, that realization that, even for me, is hard to make sometimes (it's amazing what being steeped in a corrupted culture can do to the subconscious mind) finally broke through: 

Abortion is NEVER safe. A "successful" abortion is always fatal.

There are some powerful, and probably deliberate flaws in the pro-choice rhetoric. And it is the flaws that we are battling, and not really much else. The Devil can only work through lies. These lies are powerful, because they do creep into your subconscious. They block you from using your common sense: Instead of automatically mentally seeing the unborn and thinking, "Abortion is never safe," I only thought of the person I could physically see (the mother) and thought, "Yeah, sure, it could be safe," and that's exactly how the abortion farce has been able to thrive all these years.

Remove the thought impediments. Reverse the flawed logic. The Devil knows you are a threat to his lies.