Kevin’s Conversations: In Gratitude…

The New Victor says:

The Indian and Vietnamese immigrants I’ve asked say without question, “The USA is a Christian nation.” Though they hold to their Hindu and Buddhist beliefs, they realize that the lack of corruption here compared to their home countries is somehow tied to the influence of Christianity. My boss was helped by the Catholic Church when he first escaped Vietnam and landed here. Though they didn’t convert him, he has nothing but nice things to say about them. Found this on a Catholic website. Thought it was interesting:

“A broad distinction must be made between such cases and that of those nations which having once accepted the Christian faith with its clear profession of the connection between moral obligation and a Divine law, have subsequently repudiated this belief in favour of a purely natural morality. There is no parity between “Fore-Christians” and “After-Christians”. The evidence at our command seems to establish as certain that it is impossible for these latter to return to the inadequate grounds of obligation which may sometimes suffice for nations still in the immaturity of their knowledge; and that for them the rejection of the religious sanction is invariably followed by a moral decay, leading rapidly to the corruptions of the most degraded periods of our history. We may see this wherever the great revolt from Christianity, which began in the eighteenth century, and which is so potent a factor today, has spread. It is naturally in France, where the revolt began, that the movement has attained its fullest development. There its effects are not disputed. The birth-rate has shrunk until the population, were it not for the immigration of Flemings and Italians, would be a diminishing quantity; Christian family life is disappearing; the number of divorces and of suicides multiplies annually; while one of the most ominous of all symptoms is the alarming increase of juvenile crime. But these effects are not peculiar to France. The movement away from Christianity has spread to certain sections of the population in the United States in England, in Germany, in Australia, countries providing in other respects a wide variety of circumstances. Wherever it is found, there in varying degrees he same results have followed, so that the unprejudiced observer can draw but one conclusion, namely: that for a nation which has attained maturity, morality is essentially dependent on the religious sanction, and that when this is rejected, morality will soon decay.”

em... again says:

#1 – great observation quoted there… one thing that became clear to me after i’d piled on quite a few years is the human tendency and ability to rationalize, to follow a comfortable lie as if it were gospel truth… the Church’s survival is totally dependent upon the Holy Spirit’s work in us and that’s not in our comfort zone… sometimes i think we’ve tried to drown Him out with “praise” or what we call praise today…
those 10 Commandments? forget them, we’re a fallen race and dependent on grace… well… yes and no

em... again says:

#3 – trouble is, we’ve really only got two political parties ruling the land… our choice was between a rebel, flagrant sinner and a political puppet, a lying (IMO dangerous) hypocrite…
i can’t really fault my fellow Believers for backing Trump, i truly can’t, but that said…
lately churches have been making hay off of sinners… they’d much rather parade a sinner in front of their congregations that a faithful, tried and tested Saint… God will fix this… i wonder how…
i confess that i sing, “God bless America, land that I love…” but i’m not so sure what He’ll answer and that does cause me concern today

Jean says:

I will pray for the current President the following petitions:
(1) For his health and safety;
(2) For his soul;
(3) For God to grant Him wisdom as our Chief Executive and Commander and Chief;
(4) That he stops his attacks and subtle intimidation of the press;
(5) That he would make efforts to unite our people instead of being a partisan in chief;
(6) That he would get off Twitter and take up an interest in policy instead;
(7) That he changes his mind about almost all of his stated policies regarding education, the environment (including wildlife conservation), taxation, healthcare.
(8) That he is unsuccessful in trying to gut public education, damage the environment, give tax breaks to the wealthy by taking healthcare from the poor and borrowing from our grandchildren.

That’s all I have so far.

Martin Luther's Disciple says:

Jean, so we are to pray for partisan political issues?

Martin Luther's Disciple says:

Well then that’s exactly what the evangelicals are doing – same as you – 4th petition issues.

It’s like me praying that the Dodgers win and Michael praying that the Giants win. Whoever gets the most people praying with them wins. 😉

Martin Luther's Disciple says:

The issues are not partisan – the methods of correcting the problems are (and if you don’t see that as a problem, that says something about you).

So you pray for one method and your evangelical friends pray for a different solution.You are just as bigoted and set in your ways as they are. I offer up Chicago as an example of the results of praying your way – and I don’t mean the Cubs 😉

2 generations of praying the wrong way

Martin Luther's Disciple says:

Are you saying I am arguing with a fool? I hold you in higher esteem than that.

Duane already tried that on me a couple of weeks ago. It is used as a conversation stopper.

Kevin H says:

Interrupting the current pissing match to say that for those who don’t like Trump, or before that, those who didn’t like Obama, and on and on before that, at least we can be glad that our founders had the wisdom and foresight to set up separation of powers and not to give all authority to one man (or woman). It may harm efficiency, but it sure has helped in maintaining our freedom and rights.

Now, if they only could have foreseen the presidential use of Twitter and could have outlawed when writing the Constituition. 😉

Em says:

I’m not smart enough to pray that God direct this Administration to follow my playlist, so I hope that lifting up the President and his appointees to the Throne of God, asking that He give them health, discernment, strength and the wisdom to act and that their efforts bless, not curse us… given the crazy climate of the times, praying for their safety is wise
Having a President who uses the internet to mock and vent is embarrassing, but it’s low on my list of concerns
I might add a plea that North Korea’s genuinely dangerous administration fails in whatever it is they’re trying to pull off for whomever they serve in their dangerous antics – for those who don’t live on the West Coast, don’t forget that you’re all downwinders… ?

Descended says:

Kevin

I’ve always said that nobody has the capacity to sit at the Presidents’ desk save the President. We may never know how many lives they saved or why others were not saved by their hand. But we do know it’s in God’s hands.
I could bag on Obama and Bush until the cows come home. But I will never know a thing about them or their inner circle, or the truth amongst all the deception. God bless them fur what they did, may they graciously run after Christ’s redemption as we have.

Scooter Jones says:

Where is the blog host these days? I hope he’s okay?

bob1 says:

IMHO, none of Jean’s concerns are partisan.

They’re all nonpartisan. They affect all of us — doesn’t matter whether you’re Dem/Repub/Independent, etc., etc.

Every point Jean mentioned are common to all of us as Americans.

jlo says:

My guess is that the prayer thread is the first one MLD frequents. I’ve seen him post there on the rare occasion. I believe he has said he doesn’t post there to avoid the conflict he so enjoys.