Spying on Freedom

From Wordsmith

"Many people who have grown up in socially, deeply conservative societies
have a very hard time coming to terms with the freedoms available in
liberal countries. Indeed, they take this personal liberty as a sign
of decadence, and often despise Westerners as effete and irreligious.
Unfortunately, they have no idea of the centuries of strife and struggle
that have gone into attaining this level of secularism and freedom from
the church, society, and the state."

Irfan Husain; Existential Dilemma Forced by Clash of Civilisations;
Khaleej Times (Dubai, United Arab Emirates); Dec 2, 2004.

liberal Synonyms:, bounteous, bountiful, freehanded, generous, handsome, munificent, openhanded
3: tolerant of change; not bound by authoritarianism, orthodoxy, or tradition
a. Archaic. Permissible or appropriate for a person of free birth; befitting a lady or gentleman.
b. Obsolete. Morally unrestrained; licentious.

I dare say that there are a lot of North Americans who have no idea that the heritage of NA is the reason for the “freedom and liberalism” that we hold as our inheritance from those who first came here from Europe. I am sorry that Irfan Husain does not know that the “secularism and liberalism and freedom” that is practiced in NA today is Not that on which our culture was founded. What he seems to see is the third meaning, ‘not bound by authoritarianism, orthodoxy or tradition’ where as the Archaic definition is quite appropriate for the society that came here to practice what the Bible teaches. Both Canada and the States were first settled (by Europeans) by Protestants who were looking for a country where they could act in a manner ‘permissible and appropriate for a person of free birth (the new birth as defined in the Bible) and befitting ladies and gentlemen’ !! Again I am not sure why dictionary.com says that ‘morally unrestrained; licentious’ is an obsolete definition for liberal because that defines NA today very well. It wasn’t ‘centuries of strife and struggle’ that won the bounteous freehanded generous … society that we enjoy, it was the complete surrender of themselves to God !!

Paul in the Bible had to deal with freedom spies. There were a number of issues on which he had to put pen to paper in order to establish what his freedom was, why his freedom existed and what the parameters of it really were. One of his big problems was exactly a group of people who grew up in a ‘deeply conservative society’ and could not comprehend this new fangled ‘freedom in Christ’. Even Jesus Himself had that problem ! And today there is hardly a religious group that can look at any other without crying foul.
Of course there are also some who want to turn back the clock and climb under some old ‘protective’ cover of an orthodox authoritarianism.

We are fast loosing our freedom exactly because we are disconnected from the church and society and the state. Ask anyone why they came here from their old country. The answer is because it was so bad there and it is so good here; we are loosing our freedom because we have not told the newcomers the reason for the “freedom”. And we have not kept up with our own new generations, telling them it is not freedom from authoritarianism and orthodoxy and tradition but rather freedom to Christ.

Wild Life

I have seen the huron several more times. Once we were rattling along on our way home and I stopped to watch for maybe five min. James finally got his van and we were taking it back to our place. The huron was standing beside the slough by the road but when I stopped he spread his wings and lifted off; I thought that we had seen the last of him but I consoled myself in that there was no place for him to take cover within a mile of where he was so I could watch him fly for a while. But he only flew fifly feet or so over to the other side of the slough. He stood still for the rest of the time that we watched. He did not move. Nothing. Not a twitch of a feather. Unfortunately I did not have the binoculars.
I have seen a couple more deer and a couple of cayotes.
Today I saw a fox. I was sitting here in frount of living room window at the computer when I looked up – and saw him jogging along north down the road. Timothy came at my summons to look but he did not see him. Willena was the only other person here but she did not get a chance to even come to the window. Woe is me neither my glasses nor the binoculars were at hand.

Answers

The Dalai Lama and a host of Nobel prize winners have joined actor Richard Gere for a conference aimed at righting the wrongs of modern humanity.
King Abdullah of Jordan is hosting the two-day meeting at the ancient desert city of Petra.
Delegates will discuss four key themes: terror and peace, economic development and poverty, health and environment, and education and media.

Would you like to be there? How would you solve the world’s terror problems? What would you do about poverty? North America seems to think that it has a health problem – how would you deal with the health of the rest of the world? And then there is education and the media, how would you propose to straighten that issue out?

Doesn’t it seem a little pretentious to think that they can do more than introduce the problems that they want to discuss in two days? Come to think of it I guess that we all know the problems so we could just dive right into the answers . . . which are . . . people

The world is full of people. Till we can change the nature of each individual person on earth how can we begin to alleviate the problems?

All the same I would like to be there.

Who's Ashamed?

US magazine Newsweek has said it erred in reporting that a copy of the Koran had been flushed down a toilet at Guantanamo Bay by US interrogators
"We regret that we got any part of our story wrong, and extend our sympathies to victims of the violence and to the US soldiers caught in its midst," the editor, Mark Whitaker, writes.

In Pakistan, an alliance of six conservative Islamic parties has already rejected Newsweek's retraction.
Alliance leader, Qazi Hussain Ahmed, said it was "a crude attempt, both by the weekly magazine and the American authorities to defuse the anger of the Muslims across the world".

I read an interesting column davidwarrenonline.com. DW is talking about shame, or more accurately the lack of it. For the life of me I can not imagine why Mark Whitaker would publish an article like he did in the first place and then after much harm has been done and many people hurt and killed he assumes that a mere “regret” could make it all better ! ! Talk about the lack of shame. We have a flood of people coming to North America from all over the world including many Muslim countries because it is so much worse there and so much better over here and we have all these people over here who seem to be bent on destroying what we have. Desecrating a Holy book is not the thing to do however publishing an accusing article in a major magazine against your own self interests and those of all your neibours is not the thing to do either. Of course “an alliance of six conservative Islamic parties” will reject Newsweeks retraction. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to matter whether it is in their own best self-interest or not either.
As DW said, not about this issue, they should be ashamed of themselves – but then who has shame anymore?

return

Today while I was tooling along the highway I glanced to the right. Wile E Cayote. It was a bit of a supprise, he was standing not far from the road and looking back over his sholder. Since I was on my way, as they say I owe I owe its off to work I go, I did not try to stop for a better look. That got me wishing that I could see the huron and I realized that I was at the slough where I had seen him the first time. I quickly turned to the left and there He was. By this time there was a car pulling up in the rear so I reluctantly carried on - to work.
I got to thinking when the huron is there he must feel vulnerable because there is nothing that is even half as tall as he is any where around that slough. Up the road there is another one that is mostly shielded from the road by trees and is almost completely surrounded by last years cattails. May be he likes it better there. I was wondering to myself if by chance I had seen him last week on the way home, there was an anomaly that I didn't see there tonight. I'm thinking it was him. Next time I will stop and take a closer look - the binoculars are still in the car.
Wow they are saying that there are possibly more species of animals on the earth right now than we have on record ! Recently they rediscovered a woodpecker in the States that hasn't been seen since the fourties, they have found a pine tree that they say hasn't been seen since four million years ago ... give or take ... not long ago we read about an antelope that was found in Vietnam After the war - with all that trucking around in the woods that both sides were doing and After It was all over Then they found it !
Have you seen a great blue Huron?

Meditation on Prayer

So, we were talking . . . that’s a good start ! about meditation and prayer. Is there a differance? Continued thought, solemn reflection, cogitation vrs spiritual communion. The dictionary gives ponder as the synonym for meditation though I wonder why it does not mention contemplation; thinking about something intently, deep consideration. Maybe the ‘something’ is the reason – seems that meditation is mostly supposed to be about nothing. The way that spiritual communication is viewed now-a-days is my reason for asking what the differance is between meditation and prayer. The third and eleventh steps of the twelve steps of AA refer to “God as we understand Him”. Before I go further – I am not negating AA or trying to change it. I wonder why people use a capital letter on god: could it be that god is impersonal where God gives a personal touch. Ouch! did I step on a toe? If the power greater than ourselves is “God as we understand Him” then “spiritual communion, intimate spiritual communication” is in most cases completely impersonal with nothing more than a capital G to connect us to – nothing but ourselves. ? !
Religion aside there really is a person who is God. He created us and He it was who taught us to think and to talk. Any kindergarten Sunday schooler knows that. or should ! ! God walked and talked in the garden with A & E ! I repeat that the Bible is not the final authority for the christian here on earth. God is!
Meditating is human and is a very strong effect in human affairs. The idea of attacking Medina hummmmm where was that? from the land side did not strike Lawrence of Arabia all in an instant, as I understand it he spent three weeks? out in the desert meditating on it first. Connecting ourselves to our selves is a good thing, don’t get me wrong. But since God really is there and He really is not silent Talk to Him!

Great Day

Yesterday was a great day. A great blue heron day. I don’t see them often and I wish that when I did I could spend more time watching them. When I was in high school I read a book called The Flight of the Heron but I don’t remember anything except that it took place in Scotland – I think –, I should look the book up and reread it! Actually I never have had a chance to watch one for any length of time – because I have been on the move every time that I have seen one, what a pity because they are such majestic birds.

Great Day

Beside the road that takes me to work every day there is a dug-out. As with most dug-outs beside roads, I assume, it was dug by the construction company in order to augment the volumn of dirt available for use in constructing the road. This dug-out is small by comparison to any other roadside dug-out that I have seen though I also assume that it was dug by the construction company because there is no pile of dirt the size the the dug-out itself beside it as there would be if it was dug by a farmer. This dug-out was dug beside an existing slough, a very shallow one that dries up over the course of the summer. Each year, both years, that I have driven by it in the spring there are two pairs of Canada geese, which have each raised a family there; and there are always ducks paddling about in the shallow where the slough is.
Yesterday was a great day. A great blue huron day! I have seen it there both previous years though sadly it does not stay through the summer.
I often wonder how many other people notice it as they drive by.