Tuesday's Election

After watching parts of the former president's rally at Madison Square Garden, I was reminded of the Prayer of St. Francis:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:

where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope;

where there is darkness, light;

where there is sadness, joy.

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek

to be consoled as to console,

to be understood as to understand,

to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive,

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Not a stretch, by the way, as I have it hanging in my home office, three feet away from me as I write this very sentence.

If you consider yourself a supporter of the former president, please do try and measure his words and actions against what we know to be the very best of what defines us, which I believe is well described in the Prayer of St. Francis.  Are we at our best when we call others "scum" or "vermin"?  Are we our best selves when we mock others for being different?  Are we at our best when we routinely use lies purely for self-gain?  Are we at our best when we revile the stranger and threaten the immigrant?

Thus says the Lord of hosts: Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.  (Zechariah 7:9-10)

Do we really want to give tremendous power and authority to someone who preaches hate towards others (that disagree with him) and promises "retribution" for what are his mostly personal grievances?  Is this REALLY who we are as a country?  Is this REALLY the country we want our children...and grandchildren...to inherit?

There is no middle ground here.  There is no rationalization for what he has said and promised.  In fact, give him credit for being abundantly clear.

By all means, if you can't support Vice President Harris in next Tuesday's election, well then don't vote for her.  I understand.  However, there are options other than Harris or the former president.  If you are going to vote for the former president, well then, I grieve for your lack of humanity, empathy, kindness and just plain common sense.  

My God have mercy on the United States.

Storyworth: Have you ever had a supernatural experience or an experience you can’t explain?

Prelude:  I've been busy writing responses for this Storyworth gift I was given, pretty much not posting here very often.  However, the most recent question was pretty interesting, so I'm going to be a lazy blogger and recycle it into a posting.  

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Question:  Have you ever had a supernatural experience or an experience you can’t explain?

Answer:  The simple answer to this question is NO.

Now, leaving it at that last sentence would make for a pretty boring story (not worth my time…get it?  Story…time…), and in fact I can elaborate a bit on the underlying ideas behind my answer.

I am, pretty much by my very nature, skeptical of claims related to the supernatural.  I think part of this comes from the fact that I seem hardwired towards logic, reasoning, science, and the like.  The idea of “supernatural” seems to imply that there are phenomena that can’t be explained by things like logic, reasoning, science, etc.  In fact, here’s a definition…

…which I list because it makes the point that I do believe that scientific understanding can explain things.  The fact that an explanation isn’t currently available doesn’t invalidate science…or validate the concept of the supernatural…it simply means that we don’t know enough to explain the situation.

To that last sentence, well there is something of a backdoor to this whole concept of the supernatural when it comes to how I process things.  Specifically, it is an inherently logical concept to acknowledge that there is a great deal that we (the collective we, that is) do not understand.  Therefore, maybe there is a kind of logic behind the idea of the supernatural.  My greater point though is that I do not acknowledge that there are mysterious, god-like, and maybe malevolent “hands” behind things. 

Maybe then, rolling all of this up into a kind of package, I can say that I have not experienced the supernatural and I don’t ascribe it as being the source of things I can’t explain.  Or, just because I can’t explain it doesn’t mean that I think it’s supernatural.

Does all of the above mean that I am deeply skeptical of those who claim some kind of connection to the supernatural?  That’s a two-part answer:

First, if someone is using a claimed connection (to the supernatural) to make money, then I do view them as being likely frauds and hucksters.  It’s simply too easy for a talented individual to create the appearance of the supernatural to an audience that truly wants to believe in such things right from the beginning.  History and current events show plenty of times when someone who is charismatic can get others to believe in something extraordinary; immigrants eating cats and dogs is a good (and horrible) example.  Heck, Germany, almost all of an entire nation, was sold on the outlandish fiction that somehow the Jews were responsible for every terrible thing that happened to them going back decades, if not more.  Lastly, the smart and the charismatic are talented at understanding what people want to hear (as in wanting to hear from a deceased relative), so it’s not much of a stretch that they can use that power to liberate cash from the masses.

Second, if someone truly believes that they have had these experiences and makes the choice to not monetize* that sort of thing, well, I am much more sympathetic.  I truly believe that this can be part of someone’s reality…being connected to what they view as supernatural…and it would be short-sighted and almost hypocritical for me to somehow judge that individual.  Again, I do acknowledge there are things that I (and the collective we) don’t understand, so arguing that it’s not “supernatural” but it is “as of yet unknown explanation” sounds a lot like semantics (for the very sake of semantics) to me.

 

I have been told that the reason why I have not had these experiences is that I’m not open to them.  I’m not sure what to make of that explanation.  If I were to see a daytime apparition of my late brother Chris, for example, well, then I would likely be less skeptical.  The logic of it all almost seems circular to me: You have to be open to these things to see them, but doesn’t that mean there is at least some chance that your mind will manufacture something just to fulfill the expectation? 

Finally, I will note that I can have very intense dreams from time to time.  Some of these involve people who are in and no longer in my life, such as my brother Chris.  Is this an example of the supernatural?  For example, one night this week I had a dream where Chris was standing on a street curb (other details taken out for the blog posting).  Can I logically explain this dream (in totality, the other parts of it were more like a nightmare…)?  No.  So why did it happen?  I don’t know.  Does this mean that it was a supernatural experience?  I’m going to end this by saying “that’s above my paygrade”.

A post-script of sorts:  None of the above is to imply anything about my belief in God, etc.  That’s a different story for a different time.

 

 

(*) In other words, find a way to get money from others for this “gift”.