TGIF

Muff Potter says:

Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Pastor Niemoller resisted.
They were the real McCoy.
They paid a steep price.
They were profiles in real courage, not the puffed-up blathering mountebanks of today’s big name fundagelicals.

Linn says:

“We are called to overcome evil with good, to meet hatred with the love of Christ…to lose our life so that we may truly live.”

I had a conversation with a friend today who is pro-deportation, but shocked at what is happening. She asked what happens to the children. I shared that they get left behind (sometimes ending up in foster care or with other relatives), or they go with their parents (if the process is that organized). She knows what I do and I could see some understanding coming into her eyes.

I think people are won over by a measured, careful conversation than by yelling and screaming (which occurs with both the right and the left). I try to be careful how to speak to people, even when I don’t agree with them. And, I try to practice what I preach, so I am still in contact with my immigrant friends, praying for them and helping where I can.

I also pray that this will all end; that someone will come to their senses…it’s one thing to trim waste. It’s totally different to bureaucratically overthrow a government.

JD says:

Thanks be to God that I survived a total of 40 years, 3 months and 4 days of Civil Service and Presidents Nixon through Trump. So I saw buyouts, furloughs, shutdowns, lay-off’s, fires, earthquakes, lightning strikes, floods, tornadoes, tsunamis, hurricanes, terrorism and wars. I can definitely personally identify with and pray for what the workers and their families are experiencing. Political leanings makes one seasick and the good ol’ perpetual budget rollercoaster is dizzying.
I might still give it a shot if I had to do it over again. As it is I am mostly thankful just to be alive after being jumped, stabbed in the head and crushed by heavy machinery.

Reuben says:

I was pretty successful for a while at staying clear of politics, citing the importance of day to day life, and a focus on things more important. I’m failing at that now. Bad. I’m back to reading the global news, and witnessing the global horror. When even AlJazeera starts creeping US news to the top of the headlines, you realize the world is taking notice of the new Musk/Trump regime. I have started interacting with MAGA hats again, and they are living a dream come true without realizing the scope of that dream. There is literally zero conscious left there.

I saw one glimmer of light with a Facebook group of Commercial and Industrial HVAC workers that I follow. Notifications from manufacturers have started arriving warning of price hikes due to raw material tariffs. This sparked some rather unique responses from people who are die hard MAGA hats.

I don’t feel “innocent” anymore, for lack of a better term. I stepped right back into reading my list of leftist writers, and felt the rage boiling up inside. I’m sad. I feel like I should be shouting from the rooftops, but I am trying to rebuild life. I have objectives that are life essentials.

I don’t know. I don’t know that I have the ability to resist.

Robin says:

This has been difficult for me, I cannot fathom how quickly things are going downhill while everybody is oblivious or actively sheeting it on. I cannot stomach evangelicals anymore, even my faith was severely challenged, how can people who claim to believe in Jesus become like this? I figured I needed to be angry, to fight back, or else nothing else can be done. But it was exhausting and futile, much more than that it multiplied my anger and I felt detached from who I was and my Lord. Yet I have found peace in continuing to be like I am and not giving in to worry, fear, anxiety – I will trust in God who alone can fix this terrible problem, I will remain a child trusting Him.

Muff Potter says:

Michael,I’m not familiar with Bonhoeffer asking God forgiveness for his actions.
What happened?

brian says:

What I laughingly call a “ministry” and even more pathetic a “career”, at least that is what I have often been told in the industry especially in the more true believer franchises concerning working with the elderly and those with developmental disabilities. I am at 45 years, through losing my sight, caring for four family members, three of whom have passed. Working 60-90+ hour weeks and self funding every single minute of my work in the faith. I dont say that for accolades just for maybe some small validation. Hopefully that I was not serving Satan and being a selfish vile little twit. All those things I have been told and called in my career and far worse. Some of the people I worked with were extremely violent and I wound up in the hospital more than once, I am still paying for many of the wounds. I honestly dont mind, it was an honor, they were and are the best of us to be honest.

I have no doubt God’s eternal rage is directed at me, it is a constant theme in my interactions with industry staff and the branded, mostly online. Being a special ed teacher for 34 years in that career I was able to work for a rather good retirement. I had to retire my hands, back, feet, neck, knees etc. are worn out, I have heart disease and bad sight. I was afraid I could not do the job of pushing wheel chairs or being able to dive over tables to catch someone from falling. I have done that many times and I am paying for that as well. When one is closer to the end than the beginning one looks for meaning, I find it in helping others as best I can. I dont understand why that makes me God’s enemy, but according to the best and brightest in management it does. I am a man pleaser, I have toxic empathy, I am liberal because I think Women can be pastors, I dont want to see gay people executed, I think burning witches and heretics is stupid and psychotic and any deity that wills such is not worthy of worship. I could go on.

I have been on the phone, writing letters and emails for at least four hours a day. Since President Trump has taken office. I was often doing the same when President Biden as well. All the way back to Nixon when I was younger, I even remember JFK, MLK, and Robert Kennedys assassinations. I sort of remember the missiles of October and watching the News shows about Viet Nam. I remember people with numbers tattooed on their forearms. I remember when we landed on the moon. I remember Polio survivors all that is being forgotten.

I remember when being a teacher with fifty students in a Convalescent facility where a man with one leg wanted me to get and old song from the forties. He was on the USS Indianapolis, when we played it he cried, to my eternal shame I wept as well. I understand a follower of God should not weep unless it has an apologetic value. Like I said I sometimes seek some validation, did I do good, was it worth it. When I am helping I sense God’s spirit and blessing. I am often told that is rank emotionalism and I am merely storing up wrath for eternity because of my works salvation.

despite all this I wont give up, until I cant I will continue to advocate and help.

Joe says:

I’m a member of The Satanic Temple. Not because I believe in Satan, but to emphasize how against most of modern Christianity I am. It’s my way of leaning in to being ‘othered’. It’s a tribe doing good work that can’t be hurt by status. I came across this site reading about simony. An ancient post from ye olden days of yore 2014. I thought: “2014… I wonder if these people cashed in on the Christian nationalist money train.” I’m delighted you didn’t. In the small amount of this site I’ve read the tone seems consistent… almost like a group trying to be Christ-like. I was thinking earlier today about a million Christian march on Washington. With the demographics in America that should be easy. Should be.

I see you. Keep the faith. Spread the word. Jesus was an enemy of the state.