TODAY IS ADVENT SUNDAY! The fulfillment of hope was prophesied and the angel named Him!

THE MOST JOYOUS SEASON OF THE YEAR BEGINS TODAY! One might say Easter is most joyous, but it has its Good Friday sorrow. CHRISTMAS, on the other hand, is all joy--a super celebration of Christ's ADVENT --which we began celebrating today in church with beautiful music and the lighting of the advent candle.

Even the holiday decorations, the alleged "spirit of Christmas," the holly, the ivy, the candles, lights and candy canes, the red and the green, the gifts AND Santa and Christmas movies --all part of a glorious celebration that GOD HAS VISITED THE PLANET --AND CAME AS A BABY BOY! AND SO WE LIVE FOREVER! And the world rejoices --it PARTIES! It feels altruistic/generous--and the secularist doesn't even understand why it's so thoroughly enjoyable! even though he may feel it, too!

Or is it so enjoyable for everyone? Are there many for whom Christmas is a disappointment because of fractured families, alienated children and parents? domestic violence, drunkenness and poverty? Do some stand on the outside looking in wistfully, because the joy doesn't quite reach them? Or because they stopped believing?

Christmas for me was always magical --and we were not at all wealthy when I was a child. But I didn't know it. We had enough to eat, clothes enough, kept warm, and there would be at least 2 wonderful toys for each of us under the tree --and a sock full of little things: always a bottle of coke, an orange and/or apple, a Hershey bar, toothpaste, toothbrush, a pack of gum, and other little things. So it wasn't about wealth and materialism --it was about happiness--family happiness --doting Daddy, responsible Mom. Visiting Grandparents and other family members. Daddy and I would lie on the floor, with our heads under the REAL tree with its evergreen fragrance; we'd look at the lights and our faces reflected in the ornaments while the radio played Christmas music. And sing the carols.

There was always music! When my father's family gathered, Mom or I played the piano, Dad and/or I on trumpet, Mom and Uncle Bob on violins, Ron and cousin Jean singing or with Kazoo/instruments, or wax paper covered combs --(sing through them and it makes an instrumental sound with a buzz! ) and we had jingle bells and other relatives singing.

Christmas meant feasting on turkey and mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with pecans and marshmallows --and Mom's good pies. And always the lime sherbet punch (no better Christmas punch than lime sherbet with 7 up. We actually used Ginger ale, but it's not as pretty to look at with the green sherbet. With ginger ale, I call it "river bottom punch." )

One tradition we had on my father's side of the family, which my family has continued, was to sit in a circle, pass out all the gifts, and then go around the circle, taking turns opening the gifts one by one. Each person was "on stage, in the limelight" for a short time with his gift. Gifts of limburger cheese and exotic canned delicacies of dubious nature were occasions of much clowning around --these usually came from Uncle Bob (who had his PhD and supervised PhD candidates in history and philos. of ed. for secular uni's. ) This way of doing the gifts took HOURS and extended the holiday fun for all it was worth!

Later on, family caroling to anyone who would listen became a beloved activity especially for me. Fortunately, I married a man who loved to sing and could sing --with the voice of an angel! Oddly, I don't think my children love to sing just for the fun of singing --as my parents' and I did. It was entertainment for us on car rides, especially. But they are the really good singers. I hope to get them on my website one of these days!

Happy Advent Season to all of you and yours! The Holland Free Methodist Church on Angola Road in Holland, Ohio, is making beautiful music. Our cantata is Dec. 18 and 20, 7 pm and our Christmas Eve Service is 6 pm.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

HOME ALONE --ON THANKSGIVING

Trick title. No, I wasn't home alone, but our big feast is tomorrow as the inlaws of our two married children did their gatherings today, so we had a nice ham dinner with 2 grandmas and Rob--5 of us. John and Charlotte came in tonight to stay all night so she can go shopping on this side of town tomorrow morning. (It's a shame, to me, that Southwyck Mall has been razed --flat to the ground. That area is so blighted and it used to be such a bustling beautiful place to shop! Fallen Timbers, the new mall, is out in the boondocks! in the middle of cornfields! And may it stay that way! Why does the city have to keep shifting outward!)

BACK to the topic. HOME ALONE, THE MOVIE!!

I LOVE THIS MOVIE! Except for some bad language out of the mouths of one or 2 of the kids near the beginning, this is a really good holiday film. I laugh and laugh uproariously everytime good triumphs over evil in this film where the kid gets the best of the very funny crooks. Granted, what that child does to them would not be funny in real life --but the crooks did get their just desserts! Every prank is hilarious --for comedy. And I don't think the crooks cuss either! as one would surely be tempted to do, given what happens to them!

I love that the boy hides in the manger scene at the church---and meets the lonely grandfather in the church who says church is a good place to be when you feel bad about yourself. I love that the little boy encourages the older neighbor of his to make up with his son. I love the Christmas music of the church children's choir. I love the little boy's competency --and his resolve when he announces, words to this effect: "This is my house and I'm going to defend it!"

And we laugh really hard at the polka band with John Candy telling what bad parents the other guys are --compared to the mom they are taking home from her Paris vacation --on which she forgot her child --and left him home alone --accidently, of course.

So many American values herein. Is there anyone who has not seen it?

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Christianity Imposes More Misery than Immorality??? than any other group?? Really???

More thoughts on Gianni's claim that Christians impose the most danger and misery in the world:

From the CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/us.htm

"In 2007, the largest estimated proportion of HIV/AIDS diagnoses among adults and adolescents were men who have sex with men (MSM). This category accounted for 53% of the overall diagnoses and 71% among men diagnoses."

Obviously, The misery and danger imposed by Christianity would seem to be much smaller than the danger and misery brought into the USA by MSM --and all the results of immorality in general.

Think of the fatherless children and women in poverty --and broken hearts from immorality in general. I take a little girl and boy to CLC whose pregnant white mother was just abandoned by the black father of her 3rd baby to come soon --there is NO money resource for them --other than her Uncle Sam. Yes, the law is supposed to make men pay, but it's very difficult when men don't make much money themselves to support their 2nd rent and their other children by the other women they parented kids with.

Think of those who have become ill or died from HIV who were wives and infants and transfusion receivers via men who have sex with men or prostitutes or just other infected people. MSM is used instead of "homosexual males" because there are men who have sex with men who don't call themselves homosexual.

3 out of 4 HIV/AIDS cases were male in the U.S. in 2006. 42,655 new cases in 2007.

That's a lot of unnecessary, avoidable, preventable misery. And it's not the Christians' fault.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

For Gianni Again --with Love

There is a discussion at www.chuckoconnor.blogspot.com/ where I usually get deleted for so-called "homophobic bigotry" --so I am responding to Gianni's comment here--Chuck is an agnostic married to a Christian dancer in Chicago --and Gianni is an atheist or agnostic from Michigan --also in the arts community. Like Mudrake, I believe Gianni is from Catholic school background.

Gianni wrote:

I could go on and on but I am far too angry to continue. Barb, small minded, bigoted people like you are dangerous and you and your ilk are responsible for far more hatred and misery on this planet than all the atheists and homosexuals in history combined.

I'm not angry nor hating you. But you are angry and hating people who believe the Bible about homosexuality springing from believing lies instead of truth --leading to illicit lusts --just like pedophilia, adultery, rape,incest, and porn --all are addictive and sinful and those involved feel that they cannot help themselves.

But many HAVE converted to Christ and found power to be set free from sexual addictions --including many homosexuals.

The path to happiness is not any sexual indulgence outside of a marital, straight commitment. It's to know God and know where we are going in Eternity because of His provision of Christ on the Cross.

God has purpose for your life and your body, your assignment as a male or female. We have free will and choices.

You and the biologists and psychologists have no evidence --only theories-- of congenital (from birth/inborn/genetic) cause for homosexuality--but in the background of every homosexual person you can see a lot of indicators that predict and contribute to gender identity confusion, abnormal orientation and unhealthy, illicit sex addictions.

Kids need help to be normal these days in our confusing and sinful culture. They need the guidance of the Bible and the Gospel of Christ --and parents who "get it" about how to help their kids be "normal" --in the good sense of the word.

It's ridiculous to blame Christianity for the misery in the world. The Christians are the happy people --with hope --and comfort in their sorrows. And the most deaths were caused by other ideologies and people living by no ideology except selfishness. Christianity was a big factor in those BEST qualities of America that make others want to live here --including our prosperity and freedom of religion, freedom in general.

The wars of modern times have been about power/competing for resources/greed/selfish interests and self-defense and defeating evil-doers like Hitler and other tyrants. Liberating the oppressed is a worthy goal for warriors --but killing people for religion and religious differences is not honorable. NOr is this wave of atheistic intolerance for people who think homosexuality is a sin like any other sexual sin --of which we have all been guilty to some degree or an other. As Jesus said, ALL have sinned --and all men have lusted and thus commited adultery in their hearts.

"There is none righteous, no not one," "But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." Grace is His undeserved favor. It is free. We don't have to deserve it --but we do need to repent- as Christ said in His first public preaching.
It's our pride --and maybe our lifestyles?-- that keep us from repentance.

______________________________

All of these agnostic/atheists feel strongly that the Christian God is mostly condemning and that they were made to feel mostly the judgment and guilt, resulting in self-loathing. But the Gospel really IS GOOD NEWS for all us guilty sinners.



"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Rick Warren's Thoughts on Gratitude and Purpose

An email from my Zoroastrian pen pal, a lawyer in India:

Dearest All, Regardless of how religious you are, this is very true.

This is a great interview with Rick Warren. He wrote The Purpose Driven Life, A book I recommend for all to read.

[I, Barb, loved this book, too, more when I taught it than when I first read it. A close reading as though to relay the concepts to others shows the depth, brilliance and organization of Warren's teaching mind. He makes Christian, purpose-driven living seem within our grasp --which it is.]
_______________________________________________
You will enjoy the new insights that Rick Warren has, with his wife now having cancer and him having 'wealth' from the book sales. This is an absolutely incredible short interview with Rick Warren, 'Purpose Driven Life ' author and pastor of Saddleback Church in California.

In the interview by Paul Bradshaw with Rick Warren, Rick said:
People ask me, What is the purpose of life?

And I respond: In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were not made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven. One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body-- but not the end of me. I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act - the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity.

We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't going to make sense.

Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one. The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort; God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy. We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life. The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.

This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer. I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore. Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life. No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on. And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for.
You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems:
If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, which is "my problem, my issues, my pain." But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.

We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her- It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.

You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life. Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy. It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before. I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of ease.

So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do,
II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72.

First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit.. We made no major purchases.

Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church.

Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation.

Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.

We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity?
Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)?

When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better. God didn't put me on earth just to fulfill a to-do list. He's more interested in what I am than what I do.

That's why we're called human beings, not human doings.

In happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
Quiet moments, WORSHIP GOD.
Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
Every moment, THANK GOD.
"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

A Hymn of Thanksgiving: For the Beauty of the Earth

THANK YOU, LORD!

For the beauty of the earth,
For the beauty of the skies,
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For the beauty of each hour
Of the day and of the night,
Hill and vale, and tree and flower,
Sun and moon and stars of light,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For the joy of human love,
Brother, sister, parent, child,
Friends on earth, and friends above,
Pleasures pure and undefiled,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For each perfect gift of thine,
To our race so freely given,
Graces human and divine,
Flowers of earth and buds of heaven,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For thy Church which evermore
Lifteth holy hands above,
Offering up on every shore
Her pure sacrifice of love,
Lord of all, to thee we raise
This our grateful hymn of praise.

For the joy of ear and eye,
For the heart and mind's delight;
For the mystic harmony,
Linking sense to sound and sight;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For the martyrs' crown of light,
For Thy prophets' eagle eye,
For Thy bold confessors' might,
For the lips of infancy.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For Thy Virgin's robes of snow,
For Thy maiden mother mild,
For Thyself, with hearts aglow,
Jesu, Victim undefiled.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For Thyself, best Gift Divine,
To the world so freely given,
For that great, great love of Thine,
Peace on earth and joy in heaven.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

Amen.

author: Folliott S. Pierpoint, 1835–1917

Not much is known about Folliott Sandford Pierpoint, the author of this hymn. He was born in the town of Bath, England. The inspiration for this hymn text is said to have come to the young author as he was strolling about his native town one day in the late spring, entranced by the beautiful countryside with the winding Avon River in the distance.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Letter to Sherrod Brown on Health Care, ETC.

I wrote this today:

Senator Sherrod Brown
713 Hart Senate Office Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510

Dear Senator Brown:

It is more difficult to get ahold of your office through phones than others, so we are writing. And we shall probably point out this fact in the Blade, if we can get published on the topic. Even at the top of your home page, it doesn’t say, “Contact us.” Address and phones are at the bottom. But we didn’t see an email address to make you easily accessible. We also had to get through a “gov. page” first even though we typed in Brown. We get the distinct impression that you do not want to hear from your constituents. On more than one occasion we have tried all your phones and got the same run-around. I suspect it is because you are really at odds with most of your constituents who know what’s going on and would phone.

We do not want to pay for abortions. If the Senate healthcare bill passes with abortion provisions, expect a turn-over in the senate. Surely Ohio will not re-elect you if you make people violate their consciences and provide for abortions. After all, women have choice before they get into bed. It’s one thing to allow abortion in case of rape, incest, life threat to mother, and we should push the debate there. Those of you who want to see women have abortions for any reasons can establish your own abortion “charities.” Don’t make us pay for it. James Dobson says he and his wife will go to jail or lose money before they will pay taxes for abortion. I hope many of us will have the courageous resolve to join him. But who should lose their retirement for following their consciences? We should not. What is America coming to, anyway?!! When people figure out that they will also erode their pensions with high taxes with Democrats, that should cause a sea change in the next election.

Be sure and read the Manhattan Declaration at www.manhattandeclaration.org. There was a short time when the Christians thought they should ignore politics, since they are subjects in a different kingdom, but that day is over. We are also called to be salt and light in our nation.

If you really want to reduce the cost of healthcare, have tort reform. Look for the medicare fraud and weed it out. Also, improve the economy first without saddling us with more spending programs. National defense and the military are the constitutional commitments of federal gov’t. Healthcare is something to gain through a good economy, our jobs and the insurance companies. Yes, pressure the prosperous companies to take care of people –but don’t’ kill the economy with your present agenda.

Before Rome fell, that great power was awash in idolatry, infanticide and homosexuality. We think our economic crisis is a harbinger of disaster to follow if we don’t recognize that there are higher laws than man’s and heed those laws regarding sexual mores, marriage, and respect for life. The path we are on is disastrous.

Sincerely,


Cc: Senator Voinovich; The Toledo Blade; Rev. Keith Simpson; www.thebarbwire.blogspot.com; President Obama; Marcy Kaptur

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

FROM MY EMAIL BAG --SIGN THE MANHATTAN DECLARATION

PianoPrincess sent this:

I just heard an awesome Focus on the Family radio broadcast encouraging Christians to stand for life, marriage, and freedom by signing The Manhattan Declaration.

This declaration was written by Chuck Colson (Prison Fellowship Ministries) [and former presidential advisor for Nixon who went to prison for his involvement --a wonderful Christian since --author of Born Again --about when he came to faith as an adult.]

The other authors are Robert George (Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton) and Timothy George, Professor, Beeson Divinity School, Samford 
University.

It is an amazingly well-written statement defending the sanctity of life, the dignity of marriage, and the rights of conscience and religious liberty.

This is more than another petition or "add your name at the bottom" mass email. It is a call to Christians to stand for truth on these matters which are dear to God's heart, and which are vital to our country's well-being. It is time for Christians to wake up before the freedoms we hold dear are compromised, or lost altogether.

The web site is www.manhattandeclaration.org.

Notice the signers include liberal Christians like Ron Sider and conservative ones like Jim Dobson --and a wide array of other Christian leaders, including Catholics, Calvinists, Weslyans, etc.

Also, if you want to hear the Focus radio broadcast (very challenging and culturally relevant), you can go to www.focusonthefamily.com and follow the links to broadcasts and podcasts. The title of the broadcast was "A Manifesto for Righteousness," airing on Monday, November 23.

Blessings to you all!

Piano Princess

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

EMAIL from MY CONSERVATIVE CHRISTIAN FRIEND ON EVOLUTION

Hi Barb,
Here is a little info on the fish with the "leg" fin you mentioned on Sunday.

I just got done watching a DVD by Dr. Kent Hovind and it was talking about that scenario! The Lobe Finned Fish is suppose to be an index fossil for Devonian that was from 325 million years ago. Funny thing is that the fish is still alive today and can be found in the Indian Ocean. The statement that the leg was evolving into a fin doesn't seem plausible since they still exist today. Not very likely that they have survived 325 million years. After the first fish like this was discovered, they should have gone back and challenged the geological column. I learned this and other neat scientific evidence that challenges Evolution on the DVDs by Kent Hovind. You can check them out at www.drdino.com All of the seminars are available to watch for free under multimedia, all media, all videos - this is from #4 Lies in the Textbooks. Very interesting DVDs. :)

Any lobe-finned bony fish of the order Crossopterygii. Members of an extinct suborder are considered to have been the ancestors of land vertebrates. Modern coelacanths (genus Latimeria) are deep-sea fishes with hollow fin spines. They are powerful, heavy-bodied predators, with highly mobile, limblike fins. They average 5 ft (1.5 m) in length and weigh about 100 lbs (45 kg). Coelacanths appeared about 350 million years ago and were thought to have become extinct 80 million years ago until one was caught in 1938 near the southern coast of Africa in the Indian Ocean. A second species was discovered living near Indonesia in 1998.

This gal does her research! out of her conservative Christian interest in theories of origins!

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

CALLING ALL CONSERVATIVE CHRISTIANS TO COMMENT HERE

Andthensome, the cordial agnostic/atheistic? blogger from Lancaster, CA, wrote the following:

I'll make a deal with you then, Barb, if you truly want me to stay.
If three professed conservative Christians who have never commented before indicate I should stick around, I will. Let's give it 3 days--an average of 1 a day. Does that sound reasonable?

Mudrake thinks I'll go to church to get these conservative Christian bloggers who could entice AndThenSome to stay here. Yes, I will try that.

Meanwhile, I'm going to those of you who stop in here once in awhile who have never commented --If you are CONSERVATIVE Christian, leave a comment and EXPLICITLY MENTION THAT Andthensome, the blogger, should keep commenting here. I need 3 in 3 days.

See how much we value your presence and your soul, Andthensome!

Come on, Team, CONSERVATIVE Christian commenters, COMMENT FOR THE FIRST TIME. Don't let me down!!! No one says you have to stay!

See how different this is from an atheistic blog --where they tell their philosophical opposites to GET LOST!!!

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Patrick Henry College Core Curricula

For AndThenSome, I wondered about their majors at PHC and found this in their current catalogue on line

Classical Christian Liberal Arts Education at PHC

Despite the success of homeschoolers and classical Christian
schools, few Christian colleges have taken an active part in
this educational reform movement. Patrick Henry College
was founded specifically to serve the best and the brightest
of Christian homeschooled young people. Thus, the classical
liberal arts—with a strong Biblical foundation—is at the heart
of PHC’s educational philosophy.

PHC has a rigorous and extensive core curriculum of 63 credits
plus intermediate foreign language proficiency. The University
of Chicago, which is famed for its liberal arts core, only has
45. The National Endowment for the Humanities, in a project
designed to promote liberal education, proposed 50.

The PHC core embraces all seven of the classic liberal arts:
grammar (Research and writing; intermediate foreign language
proficiency1), courses in logic, rhetoric, mathematics, geometry,
music, and science (with biology and physics taking the place
of the ancient “astronomy”).
In addition, PHC requires two courses in the history of the
United States, and two courses in the history of the Western
World, two Western Literature courses, two courses in the
theology of the Bible, Principles of Biblical Reasoning,
philosophy, Constitutional Law, economics, and two courses in
Freedom’s Foundations.

The classical liberal arts, of course, is not just a sequence of
courses, but a conceptual framework and a methodology. The
seven liberal arts cultivate mastery of language (grammar),
analysis (logic), communication (rhetoric), aesthetics (music),
numbers (mathematics), spatial relations (geometry), and
empirics (astronomy) (Veith & Kern, 2001, pp. 11-16). Thus,
other courses in a variety of subjects can contribute to this
breadth of education.

The liberal arts stress content, the imitation of excellence, the
pursuit of knowledge that is valuable in itself, and the exercise
of the whole range of talents that God has given. The liberal
arts curriculum is broad in scope, but its parts are integrated
with each other, as students explore the connectedness of all the
disciplines.

The core curriculum embraces the whole range of the content
areas, as classified according to the “Natural Sciences” (biology,
physics, philosophy), the “Moral Sciences” (history, law, the
humanities), and the “Theological Sciences” (the Bible, theology,
and the undergirding of every course in Christian truth).

The foundational liberal arts are the Trivium of grammar,
logic, and rhetoric. These have to do with mastering language.
Grammar is about exploring the structure, rules, vocabulary,
and conventions by which language operates. Logic has to do
with using the mind to analyze and discover truth, as well as
to distinguish between truth and falsehood. Rhetoric is the art
of effective communication that persuades others, and is thus a
key to cultural influence.

1) Latin and Greek have, historically, been touchstones of classical learning and these are taught on
campus; in some programs, PHC accepts other foreign languages as meeting the core requirement.
Grammar has to do with basic knowledge; Logic with
understanding; Rhetoric with creative personal application.
The Trivium is a particularly powerful concept, in that every
subject can be said to have its grammar (the foundational facts,
rules, and information), its logic (the thinking required for
understanding), and its rhetoric (its original application). In
fact, the Trivium’s emphasis on knowledge, understanding,
and application is a direct parallel to Bloom’s Taxonomy, so
that an ancient concept of education is confirmed by modern
educational psychology. Each part of the Trivium has its
appropriate method of learning: grammar by lecture, reading,
and practice; logic by dialectic (that is, Socratic questions
and discussion); and rhetoric by student performance and
application (Joseph, 2002).

At Patrick Henry, classes tend to be heavily oriented to reading
(often of the “great books” in the field) (grammar), discussion
(logic), and student projects (rhetoric). PHC’s emphasis on
Apprenticeship (specifically, the internship program) exemplifies
the rhetorical dimension of classical education, and it also follows
the model of how classical universities prepared young people for
their professions, giving them a rigorous grounding in the liberal
arts and then sending them out to practice their craft under a
master/mentor.

The classical liberal arts core curriculum is a true core. That is,
every student in every program takes every class. There is no
electivity in the core, which means that professors in the upper
level programs can know what their students have already been
exposed to—what books they have read, what subjects they
have studied, what skills they have developed—so that learning
can build on a common foundation.

One objection to having a core curriculum consisting of 63
credits plus intermediate foreign language proficiency would
be that it would seem to necessitate fewer courses in the major
program. Actually, though, since Patrick Henry—in another
unusual feature—has a restricted number of majors and
specialties, this is not necessarily the case.

A number of the core classes tie into the Government major:
A two-semester “Freedoms Foundations” sequence, studying
issues of government by discussing classic texts on the subject;
two semesters of American history; two semesters of European
history; Economics; and Constitutional Law do advance the
government program in crucial ways. The same holds true for
the liberal arts majors, with core classes directly impacting the
programs in literature, history, and liberal arts.
The upper division courses also employ a liberal arts
methodology. For example, the various Government tracks use the specialized “great books” that have shaped each discipline.

Writing at PHC is “across the curriculum,” with requirements
and formats codified in A Handbook for Research and Writing, a
college compilation that is taught in the first Freshman writing
course and serves as a reference for all courses, including the
upper division classes.

Another element of the classical liberal arts, according to
Littlejohn and Evans (2006), is a particular “ethos,” which
they describe as “the essence or the ‘feel’ of the school as a
community of faith and learning” (p. 53).
Ethos is the inarticulate expression of what the community
values. It includes the quality of the relationships within
the school, the traditions, the professional comportment,
the approach to classroom management, the out-of-class
decorum, the aesthetic personality of the school reflected
in the student and faculty dress codes, the visual and
auditory imagery, and the physical plant itself. And ethos is
interfused with the academic culture including curriculum,
pedagogy, faculty preparation, and student learning. Ethos
is the way in which the school expresses (or doesn’t) truth,
goodness, and beauty through the experiences of every
person who enters our halls (pp. 53-54).

I found it difficult to locate a simple and basic list of majors offered, but gleaned the following: Classical Liberal Arts, CLA Music Track, History, Literature. Gov't.Dep't has these major "tracks,": Am. Politics and Policy, Int'l Politics and Policy, Political Theory, strategic Intelligence, Journalism;
They offer Russian, Latin, and Greek and numerous internships. It's really impressive and very extensive what is offered --the listing of all the courses. It looks to me like you don't major in science there, but have required science and lab courses same as any liberal arts college plus Bible and theology courses.

I'm impressed with a school that focuses on thinking, debating, rhetoric, logic, writing, general classical knowledge, for use in impacting the world, possibly at the level of the decision-makers and gov't leaders.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Christopher Hitchens Does Chop Job on Palin in Newsweek

Christopher Hitchens shows his bigotry against Christians, in particular, Sarah Palin, in the November 23 issue of Newsweek.

He's nitpicking from his atheistic worldview. Shame on Palin for once saying creationism should be taught in schools --and now saying both creationism and evolution should be taught in schools. Was this really contradictory on her part? Hardly, but to Hitchens it was. The two statements are absolutely compatible. I bet the Republican base would mostly agree with either statement--considering that most Americans still do not believe that evolution is proven. Science "facts" are supposed to be observeable today, and you can't see any creatures transitioning out of their family today. Besides, no one except the blind atheists can imagine something as complex and beautiful as life and this planet evolving from nothing without a living intelligence behind the process.

Patrick Henry College has the right idea: students should understand both views of origins in order to be "educated." Also, both views have their religious aspects --their presuppositions that cannot be proven by scientific method. Both require the element of faith to believe.

He accuses Sarah of "saying anything for a cheap burst of applause." I couldn't find any evidence of this in his article. He speaks of her "enraged core constituency." Of course, he means the Religious Right --as if we could lay claim to more anger than these atheists!

He said she "hears voices speaking to her of spiritual warfare."

I'll bet, ten to one, she didn't say she "hears voices." But as for spiritual warfare, it's right there in the Bible --and all the Bible believers in the US believe the following from Ephesians 6 is good advice, truth:

11Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. 12For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

Spiritual warfare? Yes, in deed. Jesus experienced it too when Satan tried to tempt Him.

People who hate believers in God and Christ and what they believe are on the wrong side of the spiritual warfare.

Then Hitchens rants about her grandson's father and the fact that Sarah put him in the spotlight, "a fit husband for her daughter and an example to errant youth in general."

Well, what was she supposed to do? They were supposedly in love and having a baby --and the media was having a field day with her teen pregnancy. As parents do, Sarah and her husband hoped for the best, that this lemon could turn out to be lemonade. That the high school sweethearts could end up living happily ever after --as Sarah and Todd have, so far. But boyfriend's family was not as stable or ethical as Palins' --involved as his mother was in some drug problem. We don't know what happened, but Sonny Boy has been busy proving that love and respect won't work on a heel. I respect the Palins for trying --for embracing their daughter's choice, though the teen pregnancy was an embarrassment.

One wonders if Hitchens has children and if they never make mistakes --and what they would say about HIS family if his private life became public --as politicians' family life always does --at least some version of their family life! Whether it's a whitewashed snow job --or a smear --depends on who the politician is. If it's a republican, the liberal media will do what they can to discredit --as Hitchens does so lamely in this poorly reasoned report on the so-called GOP Palin Problem.

The example of the teen pregnancy was that it was OK to carry a teen pregnancy to term; a teen couple could marry and parent with family support; a young father COULD stand by his woman and be responsible --and most importantly, the babies deserve to live -whether they have Down's Syndrome or lousy fathers and mothers who made mistakes.

I don't think of Sarah as intellectual or eloquent enough to be president and her voice lacks the mellifluous quality of a politician or a con artist. But do I think she could do the job well enough? Yeah. I think she could draw good people around her and we'd be SAFER than we are with Obama --who lacks depth himself. Did I respect her for quitting the Alaska governorship? Not really. I haven't heard an explanation that really holds water for me.

But Hitchens shows his bigotry for all the people she represents in this little piece of his --people who believe in God, Christ, Bible, spiritual warfare, Satan, etc.

He cites the time Sarah's church had an African speaker who tells that his village improved once they got rid of some witches practicing witchcraft. There are practitioners of dark arts in foreign countries --and some very spooky beliefs and practices. I recommend the book "The Beautiful Side of Evil" to Mr. Hitchens.

Besides, just because your church has a certain speaker doesn't mean everyone who attends that church shares the view of everyone who steps into the pulpit - (Remember Obama's minister of 20 plus years with whom he claimed not to agree???) especially from foreign churches where the culture is different and the spiritual experiences more dramatic --even miraculous. Who are we to tell foreign people that their perspective of what God has done in their midst is erroneous? Who are we to tell a blind man that he really can't see after Jesus heals him?

Who is Christopher Hitchens to bad mouth a good Christian lady like Sarah Palin? Talk about "spiritual wickedness in high places"....

He admitted that his was a "not so humble opinion." Well, he got that right!

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

From My Email Bag --Retired Lt. col. Allen West on Ft. Hood and US Political Correctness:

Notice the emboldened paragraphs in particular:

Allen West on Fort Hood Massacre
November 7, 2009

The following is a statement released by Retired Lt. Col. Allen West:

This past Thursday 13 American Soldiers were killed and another 30 wounded at a horrific mass shooting at US Army installation, Ft Hood Texas . As I watched in horror and then anger I recalled my two years of final service in the Army as a Battalion Commander at Ft Hood, 2002-2004.

My wife and two daughters were stunned at the incident having lived on the post in family housing.

A military installation, whether it is Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine, or Coast Guard, is supposed to be a safe sanctuary for our Warriors and their families. It is intended to provide a home whereby our "Band of Brothers and Sisters" can find solace and bond beyond just the foxhole but as family units.

A military installation is supposed to be a place where our Warriors train for war, to serve and protect our Nation.

On Thursday, 5 November 2009 Ft Hood became a part of the battlefield in the war against Islamic totalitarianism and state sponsored terrorism.

There may be those who feel threatened by my words and would even recommend they not be uttered. To those individuals I say step aside because now is not the time for cowardice. Our Country has become so paralyzed by political correctness that we have allowed a vile and determined enemy to breach what should be the safest place in America , an Army post.

We have become so politically correct that our media is more concerned about the stress of the shooter, Major Nidal Malik Hasan. The misplaced benevolence intending to portray him as a victim is despicable. The fact that there are some who have now created an entire new classification called; "pre-virtual vicarious Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)" is unconscionable.

This is not a "man caused disaster". It is what it is, an Islamic jihadist attack.

We have seen this before in 2003 when a SGT Hasan of the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) threw hand grenades and opened fire into his Commanding Officer's tent in Kuwait . We have seen the foiled attempt of Albanian Muslims who sought to attack Ft Dix, NJ. Recently we saw a young convert to Islam named Carlos Bledsoe travel to Yemen, receive terrorist training, and return to gun down two US Soldiers at a Little Rock, Arkansas Army recruiting station. We thwarted another Islamic terrorist plot in North Carolina which had US Marine Corps Base, Quantico as a target.

What have we done with all these prevalent trends? Nothing.

What we see are recalcitrant leaders who are refusing to confront the issue, Islamic terrorist infiltration into America , and possibly further into our Armed Services. Instead we have a multiculturalism and diversity syndrome on steroids.

Major Hasan should have never been transferred to Ft Hood, matter of fact he should have been Chaptered from the Army. His previous statements, poor evaluation reports, and the fact that the FBI had him under investigation for jihadist website posting should have been proof positive.

However, what we have is a typical liberal approach to find a victim, not the 13 and 30 Soldiers and Civilian, but rather the poor shooter. A shooter who we are told was a great American, who loved the Army and serving his Nation and the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) stating that his actions had nothing to do with religious belief.

We know that Major Hasan deliberately planned this episode; he did give away his possessions. He stood atop a table in the confined space of the Soldier Readiness Center shouting "Allahu Akhbar", same chant as the 9-11 terrorists and those we fight against overseas in the Iraq and Afghanistan theaters of operation.

No one in leadership seems willing to sound the alarm for the American people; they are therefore complicit in any future attacks. Our Congress should suspend the insidious action to vote on a preposterous and unconstitutional healthcare bill and resolve the issue of "protecting the American people".

The recent incidents in Dearborn Michigan , Boston Massachusetts , Dallas Texas , and Chicago Illinois should bear witness to the fact that we have an Islamic terrorism issue in America . And don't have CAIR call me and try to issue a vanilla press statement; they are an illegitimate terrorist associated organization which should be disbanded.

We have Saudi Arabia funding close to 80% of the mosques in the United States , one right here in South Florida, Pompano Beach . Are we building churches and synagogues in Saudi Arabia ? Are "Kaffirs" and "Infidels" allowed travel to Mecca ?

So much for peaceful coexistence.

Saudi Arabia is sponsoring radical Imams who enter into our prisons and convert young men into a virulent Wahabbist ideology..one resulting in four individuals wanting to destroy synagogues in New York with plastic explosives. Thank God the explosives were dummy. They are sponsoring textbooks which present Islamic centric revisionist history in our schools.

We must recognize that there is an urgent need to separate the theo-political radical Islamic ideology out of our American society. We must begin to demand surveillance of suspected Imams and mosques that are spreading hate and preaching the overthrow of our Constitutional Republic..that speech is not protected under First Amendment, it is sedition and if done by an American treason. There should not be some 30 Islamic terrorist training camps in America that has nothing to do with First Amendment, Freedom of Religion. The Saudis are not our friends and any American political figure who believes such is delusional.

When tolerance becomes a one way street it certainly leads to cultural suicide. We are on that street. Liberals cannot be trusted to defend our Republic, because their sympathies obviously lie with their perceived victim, Major Nidal Malik Hasan.

I make no apologies for these words, and anyone angered by them, please, go to Ft Hood and look into the eyes of the real victims. The tragedy at Ft Hood Texas did not have to happen. Consider now the feelings of those there and on every military installation in the world. Consider the feelings of the Warriors deployed into combat zones who now are concerned that their loved ones at home are in a combat zone.

Ft Hood suffered an Islamic jihadist attack, stop the denial, and realize a simple point.

The reality of your enemy must become your own.

Steadfast and Loyal,
Lieutenant Colonel Allen B West (US Army, Ret)

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

To Gianni With Love --at Producing Joy

A very depressed agnostic or atheist wrote this about me at another blog:

"I don't agree with Barb that love is god's invention. In fact any god that wants to 'fix' or as the holy book of fairy tales actually prescribes KILL people that I love because they happen to be homosexual, well that god is the antithesis of love to me."

No one "happens to be" homosexual. And God doesn't prescribe killing them any more than the rest of us who are mortal. We all die and are under a death sentence for original sin. "The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." When Paul says homosexuals deserve death, he doesn't say there should be a death penalty other than the one that already exists for all of us. He's saying homosexuality is sin.

What we have from the God of Love is a 2nd chance to get it right and be sorry for our sins and start a new life in fellowship with Christ through the Holy Spirit of God. What we have is a chance at immortality because Christ gave His life for our salvation.

What's the alternative? the world as it is -- with all its people-imposed miseries-- and eternal non-existance at the end of life's road.

I'm taking what God has to offer! a relationship with Him. Eternal joy in His presence in Eternity. The place that Christ said He was going to prepare for those who follow Him. God's way protects people and their families from the wages of their own sinful choices in the here and now --and restores paradise in Eternity--so we need not fear death.

God's love is the best offer we'll ever get. And yes, he loves homosexuals as persons, but not what they do. I don't see how homosexuality differs from adultery or pedophilia --in being avoidable at the first thought --before action takes place and becomes addiction. But to avoid the first thoughts of sin, we must be TAUGHT what is right and what is wrong.

God gives us male or female bodies for his purposes --and for our good --and the perpetuation of life. There is no evidence to date that gender confusion starts in the womb --except for those with the extra x chromosome, hermaphadites, Klinefelter's Syndrome. And these do not typically manifest as homosexuals. They do typically identify as males and may be unaware of their abnormality.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

For Mudrake with Love: An Answer to a Good Question

In a comment, Mudrake asked me to take some time to speak of the advantages and disadvantages of agnosticism, protestantism, and Catholicism.

Agnostics have no advantages –unless you call it advantageous to feel no accountability to a God of righteousness –so they can do whatever THEY think best. They don’t believe in Christ’s deity, nor are they sure that God exists or doesn’t exist. So they can’t have a saving faith –a big disadvantage when it comes to Judgment Day. If there is a Heaven or joyous eternal life to gain and a Hell or eternal destruction to shun –and Christ is the way of salvation from the latter, the agnostic is eternally disadvantaged. Agnostics may or may not live positive lives, but their only hope of eternal life is faith in Christ which they do not profess. The Bible says, “By faith are we saved and not of works, lest any man should boast” in his own righteousness.

Catholics and Protestants share faith in Christ as our Savior. I don’t look at their differences as advantages or disadvantages, particularly, but as issues of truth based on Scripture. I do believe the Catholic Church developed unbiblical traditions and beliefs through the centuries –like papal infallibility (nothing in the Bible supports that idea), transubstantiation of the elements of the Mass, (not an essential biblical faith doctrine), the Mass as crucifying Christ anew, again and again, for our sins. Paying for indulgences. I have friends who paid the priest to annul their first marriages so they could re-marry after divorce. Their official intolerance for divorce and re-marriage allows little grace for sinful people and accepting money for God's grace through indulgences is hard to understand. Their fight for the right to life, against abortion, however, is a good example to us all.

Re: Mass: we believe the observance of The Last Supper is to be done, as Jesus said, “in remembrance of me” –symbolizing the remission of sins. The remission was done on the Cross –and the Last Supper symbolized what Christ would endure for our sins. His blood and broken body would atone for mankind’s sins and even REDEEM His sin nature –so that man could be healed and “born again” and have the sin nature in him crucified with Christ, by FAITH –not by observing the Mass as a repeat crucifixion of Christ.

We both believe in Christian baptism –but protestants see it as an “outward sign of an inward work of grace.” We don’t believe the unbaptized will go to Hell even though they have faith in Christ—but we are baptized in obedience to scripture, as a sign to the church and the world that we are identifying with the Redeemed, the universal Christian church which includes all who believe in Him as Savior. It is also symbolic of cleansing from our sins.

My church denomination, the Free Methodist, gives parents a choice as to infant baptism (as the jailer was baptized WITH ALL HIS HOUSEHOLD at the jailer’s conversion) -- or infant dedication (as Jesus was dedicated in the Temple) --with baptism to occur at the age of accountability when the child or adult understands and chooses to follow Christ. We believe that children before the age of accountability are saved, baptized or not --and that anyone can be saved by faith alone --not by the ritual of baptism.

Protestants have criticized all the richness and pomp, ritual and fancy clothing of cardinals and pope, extravagant cathedrals in poverty-stricken nations, heavy drinking and immorality in the priesthood. We see these as extra-biblical practices in the Catholic Church. And some protestant ministers and churches are no better—also wolves in sheep’s clothing. Protestant evangelicals have been guilty of legalism (seeing it as essential to one's salvation to refrain from smoking, drinking, dancing, card playing, gambling, etc.) --but most of their legalisms had Biblical principles behind them even if they weren't essential to salvation.

I think Bible study, which the Catholics are more open to now, is an advantage in Protestantism –and the more the Catholics study also, the more we come together on what is Biblical.

Granted, Bible study results in different interpretations –but we can hardly do worse than the priesthood with their development of unbiblical doctrines and traditions which are inconsistent with ANY interpretation of scripture.

Wesley did say that tradition is important, also, to discerning the will and ways of God, but we must test it against scripture for validity. The Weslyan Quadrilateral for knowing God’s will, hearing His voice, includes scripture, tradition, reason AND experience. All used by the Holy Spirit to guide us. But Scripture is the standard to which the other 3 are subject.

Other advantages: The music of evangelical protestantism has always been inspired and varied. Catholic Church tends to revere too much the style and tradition of music in a minor key. Agnostics don't allow themselves the joy of Christian music, performing it or attending churches to hear it.

There is the advantage of Christian church community life. Church can be a family beyond your own blood relatives --which may care for us more than our relatives in some cases --especially for those who don't live near family.

The Church is a channel for charitable work in the local community that agnostics may not have as much outlet for.

Church may provide a smaller peer group for children and youth to combat the cold, impersonal, cruel world that public school is for so many.

Church helps us raise our children to be good people with consciences and happy people with hope for their eternal futures. It's sad when we use fear of the negative more than the hope of the positives in our parenting (or church teaching/preaching) style, thus turning children away from faith and church. The love of God must be primary and the love for each other --and His statutes and principles (those do's and don't's) must also be communicated as being for our good --which they are.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

I LOVE THIS COLLEGE --PATRICK HENRY! The Place is a Testimony!

Patrick Henry is a 6 day Creationist school as described

here.

And then the Student Covenant is found here --and printed below.

I, a student of Patrick Henry College, commit to love the Lord my God with all my heart, soul, mind and strength; to love my neighbor as myself; and to bring glory to God in obedience to His Word through the following principles:

I will present my body as a living sacrifice to God, honoring Him in all my actions and seeking a balanced, godly life. (Romans 12:1, 6:13; Ecclesiastes 3:1)
I will guard my thoughts, striving to maintain a pure and blameless mind. (Proverbs 4:23; Philippians 4:8)
I will guard my heart, being careful not to defraud others in my relationships. (1 Thessalonians 4:3-8; Song of Solomon 8:4)
I will guard my tongue, speaking that which is wholesome and edifying. (Ephesians 4:29; Exodus 20:7)
I will regularly meet with other Christians for worship, prayer, encouragement, instruction, and spiritual accountability. (Hebrews 10:25; Acts 2:42)
I will honor and obey all divinely appointed authorities. (Ephesians 6:1-3; Romans 13:1)
I will not judge others who believe differently from me, realizing that they have freedom in Christ in matters of conscience. (Romans 14:13; Colossians 2:16-17)
I will resolve conflicts with others directly and humbly, speaking the truth in love. (Matthew 18:15-17; Ephesians 4:15-16)
I will not become enslaved by anything except the love of Christ, which is the power to set me free. (2 Corinthians 10:3-5; John 8:32-36)
I will pursue knowledge and wisdom through Christ, for His glory alone. (Proverbs 2:2-5; 1 Corinthians 8:1)

Student Honor Code

We, the students of Patrick Henry College, fully aware of our daily dependence on the grace of God, commit to set ourselves apart in thought, word, and deed, to honor Jesus Christ, and to love our neighbor. We passionately aspire to live our best for the Lord by conducting ourselves in the spirit of Titus 2:11-12: “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age.”

Therefore, I pledge, by the grace of God, to submit to proper authorities, to be honest, to respect the property of others, and to speak edifying words. I will refrain from using any substances, such as alcohol, tobacco, and drugs, in any way prohibited by proper authority such as the government, church, family, or school. I will reserve sexual activity for marriage, shun sexually explicit material, and seek parental counsel when pursuing a romantic relationship. Finally, I will seek biblical resolution and reconciliation in my conflicts. I pledge to hold my fellow students accountable to these principles and ask that they do the same for me, in order that Jesus Christ might be honored and glorified.

The Student Honor Code was enacted by votes of the Student Senate on September 22 and November 18, 2008, and approved by votes of the entire student body on September 29 and November 23, 2008.

What's interesting, in light of this very conservative Christian and spiritual perspective, is that the campus does have on campus formal and informal dancing and tells in their page on area attractions about a dance hall where students swing dance on Saturday nights and may study other dance, such as ballroom, salsa, etc.

I wouldn't mind being educated at Patrick Henry myself! There are many very good Christian colleges with distinctive aspects. Greenville, e.g., in Illinois, is known for contemporary Christian music major (Jars of Clay attended there and Chaz Corzine, manager of Christian groups), their acapella choir --link here and on my blogroll and their physics, pre-med, education, adult ed, and environmental science programs. And Yours Truly! Then there is Wheaton [Il] called the Harvard of the Christian schools and just as hard to get into, which sends out excellent grads in many fields. A recent Speaker of the House was from W.C.--and Billy Graham. You can hear a wonderful family/teen counseling centered broadcast every noon on WPOS, 102.3FM from a school at Azusa Pacific U. Azusa, Seattle Pacific, Roberts Weslyan, Spring Arbor, Greenville and Central in McPherson, KS --are all good Christian colleges affiliated with the Free Methodist Church. Huntington University (IN) (United Brethren) has beautiful facilities (thanks in part to Merillat fortune) and excellence in theater/musical theater and philosophy and religion. IN fact, all the Christian schools are good places for philos/religion majors. Moody Bible Institute in downtown Chicago and Taylor University (IN) (in the middle of corn fields) are other good schools in the area. Last I heard, if you go to Moody, tuition is underwritten: you only pay for room and board. Cedarville (Baptist & Calvinist) and Mt. Vernon Nazarene (Arminian) colleges in Ohio deserve inclusion in the list of many wonderful smaller Christian schools. Also, Indiana Weslyan, Liberty Baptist and Regent U.

Ultra conservative/fundamentalist schools include Pensacola in Fla. and Bob Jones U.

Of course, the bastions of atheistic education are the ones we pay for with our tax money--schools which started out as Christian schools also --like Princeton. The Christian schools today are the ones where the students still write their own papers, don't get to evaluate their own profs to the extent that they hold the prof's evaluations over their heads (which must affect the ability to objectively evaluate the students) -- and don't get into binge drinking every weekend and can't fornicate in the dorms.

Which grads are better educated, I wonder?



"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

PATRICK HENRY COLLEGE BEATS HARVARD!!!!

A little Christian school, choice of many home school grads, defeated Harvard this month in mock trial competition! See article.

A PHC mock trial team beat Harvard University and Boston College in an intense tournament held at Harvard University in Massachusetts the weekend of November 7-8. PHC won four ballots in their first two rounds then lost four ballots to Brown University and the University of Illinois.

The division also included teams from Elgin College, and the universities of Princeton, Massachusetts, Villanova, Wake Forest and Yale.

“When word got around that Harvard was ‘crushed’ by PHC, and the Harvard team learned this was only PHC’s second year doing mock trial, they were shocked,” Pettus said.

AND THAT'S NOT ALL!!! PATRICK HENRY WON ITS THIRD MOOT COURT NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP IN FIVE YEARS last January, 2009.

For the third time in five years, Patrick Henry College has won the American Collegiate Moot Court Association (ACMA) National Championship. Having sent a maximum-allowed roster of eight qualifying teams to Orange, CA, the College earned first, second, and third-place team trophies in a 64-team, 128-competitor field from across the country.

Heh heh. So Ivy League schools are best and their grads are the best? Maybe not!!!
So Christians are ignorant, stupid, irrational, uneducated, etc.? Maybe not!!!

For more info about Patrick Henry, go here.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

GLOBAL WARMING PODCAST BY THE SKEPTICS TONIGHT--Nov. 17th, 7 pm CDT or 8 pm EDT

I have not studied the issue myself and I do not have any firm opinion about global warming but notice the statement below: that the hottest year and decade (on record) were the 1930's when we didn't have as many people or the same environmental aspects as today. Notice the concern for economy if we pursue vigorous green policies overnight.

It occurs to me that God could allow us to deceive ourselves over this issue as part of our national downfall because we are choosing to worship creature more than Creator (again). He could even give us an untypically warm year this year (as last year seemed untypically cold)so that we will continue in our own folly of self-deception. Yes, I know, that view of God as bringing judgments to nations in order to bring repentance is a popular theme with atheists. They don't like a God of Judgment and Justice, giving us what we deserve, so they just decide He doesn't exist at all, and reject the idea of the God of Love who sent the Christmas Gift of Redemption in Christ.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Join us to see this video about the next "religion" threatening Christianity:

Important free broadcast - Not Evil Just Wrong – Global Warming Science or Religion?

Who: Everyone, all skeptics are welcome.

Where: AFA Action Alert Video webcast and AFR radio stations nationwide.

When: Tuesday November 17, 2009 7pm CDT or 8PM EDT

Tim Wildmon and Crane Durham of AFA will be joined by Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer, the makers of the movie "Not Evil Just Wrong," along with other guests including members of Congress and business people as we discuss the Green Religion that is being scared upon us by the secular humanists. Get the facts and counter the myths. We have brought out the experts to arm you. The webcast will clearly lay out the distortions and the marketing strategy involved in this deception. See why our leaders have embraced this movement to grab total control of our lives and use population control to satisfy their reckless desire for power. There will be live blogging from the audience and phone calls as we expect the turnout to be large as this issue is critical to our families' future.

The documentary is available for purchase if you miss the webcast. We will also make the 2 hour broadcast available on DVD.

Movie Facts
Global warming alarmists want Americans to believe that humans are killing the planet. But Not Evil Just Wrong, a new documentary by Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney, proves that the only threats to America (and the rest of the world) are the flawed science and sky-is-falling rhetoric of Al Gore and his allies in environmental extremism. The film drives home the realities of that extremism. "Turn off your lights. Turn off your heat when you get cold. Turn off your air when you get hot," one man on the street says. "And then think about that."

Not Evil Just Wrong warns Americans that their jobs, modest lifestyles and dreams for their children are at stake. Industries that rely on fossil fuels will be crippled if the government imposes job-killing regulations on an economy already mired in recession. Small towns in the heartland, like Vevay, Ind., will become bastions of unemployment and poverty. Breadwinners like Tim McElhany in Vevay will lose their jobs -- and will have to start borrowing money again just to buy bread for their families.

The damage that would be wrought is unjustified by the science. Not Evil Just Wrong exposes the deceptions that experts, politicians, educators and the media have been force-feeding the public for years. Man-made pollution is not melting the polar icecaps. The ocean will not rise 20 feet in a flash. And the only polar bears dying because of man are the ones who try to eat men.

McAleer and McElhinney debunk what, for a time, was the environmental movement's most powerful weapon of disinformation, the infamous "hockey stick" graph that attributed a supposedly unique burst of warming in the 20th century to humans. They also shatter the myth that the hottest years in the United States were 1998 and 2006. The hottest year was 1934, and the hottest decade was the 1930s -- when there were half as many people and no SUVs or jumbo jets.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

FOR LIBERALS: WHAT IS GLSEN AND WHAT DO THEY ADVOCATE FOR OUR CHILDREN?

I have a theory --that liberals, in general, have no idea what GLSEN is trying to do in our schools --besides promoting "tolerance" for persons of all sexual orientations. GSLEN stands for Gay Straight Lesbian Education Network. I doubt very much that GLSEN explains their specific educational aims to their liberal supporters --but only to those on the GLBT (gay,lesbian, bisexual, transgender) mailing lists. At least, I have this HOPE that normal folks who happen to be liberal would nevertheless not want what GLSEN wants in our schools!

CWA, Concerned Women for America, reports the following pornographic propaganda which GLSEN is promoting for sex ed. --successfully in some cases. All the info below is shortened slightly from their letter:

"Fistgate" refers to the time when GLSEN got caught teaching Mass. schoolchildren as young as 14 about the dangerous and painful gay activity of "fisting." I don't think they were saying, "Don't let this happen to you!" Even if they were, do kids have to hear about this practice??? They conspired with school officials to hide the info from the parents and sued a man who publicly exposed the obscene classes.

The above link tells about GLSEN's sex ed conference in Boston to which they bused students in, age 14 up. The supposed goal is to prevent AIDS by teaching kids some "safer sex" activities, including the use of "dental dams" for the mouth, and various mutual masturbatory activities which, ostensibly, wouldn't give anyone HIV or a baby.

Years ago, when the Red Cross was educating my school board and all the others in the area about AIDS, they listed several unheard-of activities like "golden showers" that the gays of San Francisco themselves were saying they should avoid--anything that mixes fluids. I would hope that GLSEN would not even mention activities like golden showers ( which includes urinating on wounds from sado-masochistic whipping.) It's just one more example of the mental illness which is same sex orientation.

The Red Cross nurse educator noted that the rectal lining is so thin that the practice of anal sex is very dangerous as abrasion is likely, condom or no condom. But GSLEN thinks we should tell kids that the use of dental dams will protect the practice of "rimming," or putting the mouth on the behind --where fecal matter would be ingested without use of a dental dam. They suggest to youth that condoms and other prophylactics make everything safe enough.

I noticed the BLADE editorial last week saying there is a yuk factor to kissing pets on the mouth or giving them CPR --and wondered that no one but me and other "intolerant" folks note the ycch factor to gay sex. Why are we afraid to speak the truth about these unhealthy and promiscuous practices?

Kevin Jennings is the founder and longtime director of GLSEN whose avowed goal is to promote homosexual and transsexual acts as "good for kids" --and he is Obama's new ass't deputy sec'y for public schools!! He's the one who tells the story repeatedly about a 15 year old boy who came to him for help when he was a teacher. The boy said he had sex with a man he met in a Boston bus station. Jenning's response was to tell him --according to his own words, "Well, I hope you knew to use a condom," instead of alerting police, the school and the boy's parents to this report of statutory rape.

Jennings has also spoken viciously in bigoted terms against Christians. He also describes in his autobiography, Mama's Boy, Preacher's Son, [potentially a gay-producing combo, I suspect] his extensive use of drugs and alcohol in h.s. and college. He made fun of his mother for not recognizing the smell of marijuana smoke on him.

I've mentioned before Jesse's Dream Skirt, a book for kids that promotes cross-dressing and gender confusion among children. This is actually part of GLSEN's "Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual/Transgender Lesson Plan Guide for Elementary Schools." Along with the book about the gay penguins and their "family" --I wonder where they get the kid. And various books featuring two moms or two dads as positive, minus the opposite sex parent in the home.

All the social indicators still say that the original mom and dad parenting as a functional family give their children a leg up in life, economically, academically, socially, emotionally. So why would we encourage any other arrangement?? Especially activities with the yccch factor.

Homosexuals deny it, but I'm sure that being deprived of a mother can incline a girl toward lesbianism and being deprived of a father could incline boys the same way--and I think the social science is out there to confirm this tendency for children who lack one parent or the other. The so-called "pregnant man" was such a girl, whose mother died and she was raised by Dad and brothers.

PARENTS, ASK YOUR SCHOOLS ABOUT THEIR SEX ED AND DIVERSITY EDUCATION. Ask if you can opt your child out. Ask if these perverse books are in the school libary. And if so, why? Schools make choices on how to spend the library funds provided by the taxpayers; schools DO censor and make choices in their purchasing; parents should have a say. We need to stop promoting to children this primrose path to perdition --the childless, abnormal, dangerous, typically promiscuous, same-sex lifestyle.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

From My Wonderful Email Bag: "Two And A Half Men" Unfit for Prime Time or Any Time

November 13, 2009

Toys 'R' Us and Mac sponsored 'Two And A Half Men'

"Two and a Half Men" has always been a program with questionable content. Most parents agree this show is highly offensive and would like to see it off the air. OMM was especially concerned when this week's episode aired the two men whom are brothers in a 3-some with a total stranger they met at a bar. Keep in mind this program airs on CBS at 8:00/7:00 central.

The sitcom starts off with the family discussing Charlie Sheen's character being engaged and actually setting a wedding date. He is extremely concerned about the expense of the wedding and then his housekeeper reminds him how much money he has spent on "wh*r*s" and he agrees.

Followed by his teen nephew discussing how many women his uncle has slept with to Charlie's fiancée. He stated over 1,000 and his fiancée is not shocked at all by his accurate guess. His nephew also said, "One woman had a concealed weapon and you would not believe where she hid it!"

Stressed over setting a wedding date, Charlie and his brother go to a bar, get drunk and find themselves in a strange women's bed together. The three are shown in bed to portray a 3-some. And the two men sneak out before the mystery woman wakes up wearing each other's underwear.

The following morning they have flashbacks of their s*xual escapade. Sheen ends up lying to his fiancée after cheating as if it never happened since he doesn't have any recollection of the act itself.

This episode ended with the grandmother discussing cheating on her ex-husband when a circus group came into town and is vague with how many men, but she does tell exactly where she had to remove sequins from.

"Two and a Half Men" is following a trend to desensitize America, including children, to recognizing 3-somes as normal, casual fun or a simple accident. This irresponsible behavior is horrendous and dangerous to society and anyone who views these actions.

This "comedy" is not funny and not OK. No excuses!

TAKE ACTION

Please send Toys 'R' Us and Mac (Apple) an email letter urging them to no longer sponsor "Two and a Half Men." Hopefully with Christmas around the corner they will decide to no longer support this disgusting program.

Send Your Letter Now!
Thank you for caring enough to get involved. If you find our efforts worth supporting, would you consider making a small tax-deductible donation to help us continue?

Sincerely,

Monica Cole, Director
OneMillionMoms.com

P.S. Please forward this to your family and friends! Become a fan of OneMillionMoms on Facebook!

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Also from the ol' E-Mail Bag: Outrageous --Obama Appointment of "Devout Muslims" to Homeland Security Posts

There IS something to be said for people who know the culture, the language, and the religion in security positions --but at first glance, I understand the skepticism! I think it's too risky!

Well, boys and girls, today we are letting the fox guard the henhouse.
Tomorrow, the wolves will be herding the sheep!

Obama Appoints two devout Muslims to homeland security posts. Doesn't this make you feel safer already?

Obama and Janet Napolitano Appoint Arif Alikhan, a devout Muslim as Assistant Secretary for Policy Development Source for announcement: Homeland Security Press Room. http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/06/obama-appointment-arif-ali-khan-asst-secretary-dhs.html

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) is proud to announce that the DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano swore-in Kareem Shora, a devout Muslim, who was born in Damascus, Syria as ADC National Executive Director as a member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC).http://www.adc.org/
NOTE: Has anyone ever heard a new government official being identified as a
devout Catholic, Jew or Protestant...?
Just wondering
Doesn't this make you feel safer already??
Devout Muslims being appointed to critical Homeland Security positions?
That should make our homeland much safer, huh!!
Was it not men of the "Devout Muslim Faith" that flew planes into U.S.
buildings not too long ago. What the heck is this president thinking?



This announcement was made on Aug 20. Why are we just now hearing about it???

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

From My Email Bag: A German's Point of View on Islam

A German’s point of view on Islam
by Dr. Emanuel Tanay, Psychiatrist

A man whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II owned a number of large industries and estates.
When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.

‘Very few people were true Nazis ‘he said,’ but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care.
I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools.
So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen.
Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come.
My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories. ’

We are told again and again by ‘experts’ and ‘talking heads’ that Islam is the religion of peace, and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectra of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.

The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history.
It is the fanatics who march.
It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide.
It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave.
It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honor-kill.
It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque.
It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals.

The hard quantifiable fact is that the ‘peaceful majority’, the ‘silent majority’, is cowed and extraneous. Communist Russia was comprised of Russians who just wanted to live in peace, yet the Russian Communists were responsible for the murder of about 20 million people. The peaceful majority were irrelevant.
China’s huge population was peaceful as well, but Chinese Communists managed to kill a staggering 70 million people. The average Japanese individual prior to World War II was not a warmongering sadist. Yet, Japan murdered and slaughtered its way across South East Asia in an orgy of killing that included the systematic murder of 12 million Chinese civilians; most killed by sword, shovel, and bayonet.
And, who can forget Rwanda, which collapsed into butchery. Could it not be said that the majority of Rwandans were ‘peace loving’?

History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points:
Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence.
Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany, they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.

Peace-loving Germans, Japanese, Chinese, Russians, Rwandans, Serbs, Afghanis, Iraqis, Palestinians, Somalis, Nigerians, Algerians, and many others have died because the peaceful majority did not speak up until it was too late.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts: the fanatics who threaten our way of life.

Emanuel Tanay, M. D.
_______________________________________________

Dr. Emanuel Tanay, MD
Wayne State University Ann Arbor, Michigan A clinical professor of psychiatry at the Medical School, Dr. Emanuel Tanay MD is a well-known forensic psychiatrist who has been an expert witness in many famous cases, such as the trials of Jack Ruby, Ted Bundy, Sam Sheppard, and Robert Garwood. He is licensed to practice in Ohio and Georgia, as well as Michigan.
Dr. Tanay has served as an officer or committee member of many professional organizations, such as the Michigan Psychiatric Society, the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, the American Psychiatric Association (APA), and others.
He is a diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology and of the American Board of Forensic Psychiatry and a distinguished fellow of the APA and the American Academy of Forensic Sciences (AAFC).
A Holocaust survivor himself, he coauthored a book about the survivors of the Holocaust and was asked by the German government to consult on just compensation for the Holocaust survivors.
Dr. Tanay has served on several journal editorial boards, authored many publications, and presented countless times on forensic medicine.
His efforts have also produced many awards and commendations from groups such as the Michigan State Medical Society, APA, the Detroit Institute of Technology, and AAFC, among others.

http://www.onthewing.org/user/Islam%20-%20German%20looks%20at%20Islam%20-%20Tanay.pdf

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

From Voice of the Martyrs

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

FROM MY EMAIL BAG --JOYS OF MUSLIM WOMEN --BY NONIE DARWISH

Joys of Muslim Women
by Nonie Darwish

In the Muslim faith a Muslim man can marry a child as young as 1 year old and have sexual intimacy with this child. Consummating the marriage by 9.

The dowry is given to the family in exchange for the woman (who becomes his slave) and for the purchase of the private parts of the woman, to use her as a toy.

Even though a woman is abused she cannot obtain a divorce.

To prove rape, the woman must have (4) male witnesses.

Often after a woman has been raped, she is returned to her family and the family must return the dowry. The family has the right to execute her (an honor killing) to restore the honor of the family. Husbands can beat their wives 'at will' and he does not have to say why he has beaten her.

The husband is permitted to have (4 wives) and a temporary wife for an hour (prostitute) at his discretion.

The Shariah Muslim law controls the private as well as the public life of the woman.

In the West World (America) Muslim men are starting to demand Shariah Law so the wife cannot obtain a divorce and he can have full and complete control of her. It is amazing and alarming how many of our sisters and daughters attending American Universities are now marrying Muslim men and submitting themselves and their children unsuspectingly to the Shariah law.

By passing this on, enlightened American women may avoid becoming a slave under Shariah Law.

Ripping the West in Two.

Author and lecturer Nonie Darwish says the goal of radical Islamists is to impose Shariah law on the world, ripping Western law and liberty in two.

She recently authored the book, Cruel and Usual Punishment: The Terrifying Global Implications of Islamic Law.

Darwish was born in Cairo and spent her childhood in Egypt and Gaza before immigrating to America in 1978, when she was eight years old. Her father died while leading covert attacks on Israel. He was a high-ranking Egyptian military officer stationed with his family in Gaza .

When he died, he was considered a "shahid," a martyr for jihad. His posthumous status earned Nonie and her family an elevated position in Muslim society.

But Darwish developed a skeptical eye at an early age. She questioned her own Muslim culture and upbringing. She converted to Christianity after hearing a Christian preacher on television.

In her latest book, Darwish warns about creeping sharia law - what it is, what it means, and how it is manifested in Islamic countries.

For the West, she says radical Islamists are working to impose sharia on the world. If that happens, Western civilization will be destroyed.

Westerners generally assume all religions encourage a respect for the dignity of each individual. Islamic law (Sharia) teaches that non-Muslims should be subjugated or killed in this world.

Peace and prosperity for one's children is not as important as assuring that Islamic law rules everywhere in the Middle East and eventually in the world.

While Westerners tend to think that all religions encourage some form of the golden rule, Sharia teaches two systems of ethics - one for Muslims and another for non-Muslims. Building on tribal practices of the seventh century, Sharia encourages the side of humanity that wants to take from and subjugate others.

While Westerners tend to think in terms of religious people developing a personal understanding of and relationship with God, Sharia advocates executing people who ask difficult questions that could be interpreted as criticism.

It's hard to imagine, that in this day and age, Islamic scholars agree that those who criticize Islam or choose to stop being Muslim should be executed. Sadly, while talk of an Islamic reformation is common and even assumed by many in the West, such murmurings in the Middle East are silenced through intimidation.

While Westerners are accustomed to an increase in religious tolerance over time, Darwish explains how petro dollars are being used to grow an extremely intolerant form of political Islam in her native Egypt and elsewhere.

In twenty years there will be enough Muslim voters in the U.S. to elect the President by themselves!

I think everyone in the U.S. should be required to read this, but with the ACLU, there is no way this will be widely publicized, unless each of us sends it on!

This is your chance to make a difference...!

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible

Mom's 2nd Career

After being a mom and home-maker and church/school volunteer, Jane Shutt Mason became the archivist of the United Brethren Church --when she was almost 60-after my father died of colon cancer at 58. She had the distinction (and connection) of being a previous president's daughter-in-law and long-time member of the college church.

This was like being a museum procurer,church librarian, preservationist. She traveled with some nuns who were attending national conferences on archives for Victory Noll, the convent in our county. Her archives were like a large closet in the church headquarters building.

When Huntington College -now Huntingon U.--built their new library, the church archives were installed in the library's beautiful walk-out basement and she became the college archivist as well. I think she was then an employee of the college, not sure. She says yes. She thinks she was the college librarian; she was not that.

But she used a computer, and rotated displays of historical items, and helped to choose and design a large and appropriate facility with appropriate cabinets and humidity level controls for preserving old documents. She catalogued and organized the place according to the latest archival standards.

Among those documents are letters from the Wright brothers and their father, who was a bishop in the UB Church. An excellent and most interesting book for young people and adults is The Bishop's Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wrightby Tom D. Crouch - 1990.

The museum/archives also includes old church and college publications --including those published by my great grandfather, Emmet Mason, church publisher. Mom has an excellent large photo of him and his family dated 1894 --handsome people! Great Grandma wrote on the back the colors and prices of her then 2 children's outfits --bright blue for little Harry, $4 (he became college president) --and red for his sister Ilah, $2.

Mom did this until she was 80, after Rob had arrived there for college, which was 1997.

One day, she turned in the exit doorway to go back and retrieve her glasses, which she had forgotten, and fell and broke her hip. Fortunately, though it was after hours and no one was there to help her, she had a cell phone that was inexplicably charged --inexplicably since she never used it--and she was able to call 911 and say "Help, I've fallen and I Can't Get Up!" (Just like the famous commercial!) She says she retired the next day. Rob moved out of dorm to stay and help her in her recovery. She had excellent hospital re-hab and some handicap bars installed so she could help herself.

A few years later, she had double knee replacement and Rob went back to help her then, also. She got around with her new knees much better than for 2 or 3 decades previous.

About Dad, Wendell D. Mason, he was a quality control chemist for Huntington Laboratories and also a part time chem teacher at IU-PU extension in Ft. Wayne. And great fun, filled with affection and kindness for his family. Always and ever a gentleman --with the common touch, well-liked by all who knew him, including those who worked at the plant where he worked in the lab.

Together, they were a disciplined couple, faithful in church and parenting, who provided a happy home for me and my brother and passed the baton of faith in God and His Son. They taught us principles of tithing, modesty, generosity, kindness, frugality, and the ability to make friends at all social levels. Our family was not wealthy at all --but practical and frugal, without vices --and they borrowed at low interest (gov't loans) and sent us to college --where I married an ambitious, successful guy. After some lean economic times at the beginning of our marriages, my brother and I have never known want --and have been able to afford things our parents never did. They also passed on to us the value of staying married --and parenting faithfully.

"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible