Homeowner shoots and kills fleeing burglar, and no charges will be filed.

San Antonio - April 29, 2008
Three people were asleep in a home in the 5300 block of Midcrown when the homeowner heard a noise in the kitchen. He grabbed a gun and investigated, and police say when he saw an intruder in his home, he opened fire.

But Police Sergeant Gabe Trevino said today the suspect began running, and the homeowner kept shooting. "The homeowner followed him out, and continued to fire at him," Trevino said.

The state's 'Castle Doctrine' law, approved in the last session of the Legislature, gives law abiding citizens wide latitude in shooting intruders in their homes, businesses, and cars. The citizen no longer has to be able to demonstrate that he first 'retreated' from the intruder, it places the presumption of innocence on the homeowner and not on the intruder, and it prohibits the intruder or his heirs from filing a civil lawsuit against the homeowner.

Trevino says an investigation is continuing, but as of now no charges have been filed against the homeowner. "If in fact it was a burglar, and the homeowner was protecting his property, he has every reason to protect his property by state law," he said.

The intruder, who has still not been identified, was pronounced dead on the scene.

I wonder what effect this law will have? Will it lead to more shootings like this? Or less burglaries?

Do you think this new law is a good thing?

As a follow-up to this personal post about how I was bullied as a child, I did a little research. Here's what I found:

Florida is currently working on the toughest anti-bullying law ever.

Although many school districts in Florida... have anti-bullying policies, the law would require each of the state's 67 districts to adopt a policy that complies with the new requirements by Dec. 1.

The law would not spell out which categories of students need protection, a fact that spurred debate in the House, but instead says that bullying or harassment of any student or school system employee for any reason is prohibited. Districts would be allowed to identify categories of students if they choose.

''When you start just putting categories in place, you'll never have enough categories to cover every child, so why don't we say that no child should be bullied,'' said Sen. Carey Baker, R-Eustis, who sponsored the bill. ``The fact is all children will be protected.''

In a 2005 national survey of students ages 12 to 18, about 28 percent reported having been bullied at school during the prior six months.

The proposed law mandates that each district's policy have in place a procedure for reporting incidents of bullying or harassment and the consequences.

Here's the actual text of the proposed law.
Basically it requires schools to have policies in place. Even cyber-bullying is included here.

Sad that it takes deaths to bring our attention to problems, but alas that seems to be the way it is. This law will be named after a 15 year old who killed himself because of bullying.

This brief article about the law has some good statistics about bullying. There's also a really good video clip on the bottom from "The Early Show". It's worth watching.

This story sums it all up for me.

“On April 16, 2002, my son, 14-year-old Jon Gettle, left his home during the night, walked 200 yards to his middle school and hung himself outside the 8th grade hallway. His note said, "Bullying is a problem". Cathy Gettle (NY) – Mother of Jon Gettle

My original post and subsequent comments have led me to start thinking about how to start a ministry for victims of bullying. I just haven't figured it all out yet.

And this video is a reminder of how serious the issue is. (Listen to the words of the song, while you are watching. Multi-tasking, I know, but you can do it :-)



There, but for the grace of God, is where I would have gone.

Senate Passes Resolution Saying McCain Is Natural Born.

Sen. John McCain was born to American parents in the Panama Canal Zone some 71 years ago. Does that make him the kind of “natural born” citizen the Founding Fathers determined could serve as president?

Yes, the Senate agreed, and senators passed by unanimous consent a resolution to that effect Wednesday.

Not that there was much doubt about it. Even Democrats, including rivals Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, have said they didn’t see a problem with McCain meeting the constitutional requirement that only a “natural born” citizen could serve.

Still, there had been questions in the minds of some bloggers because McCain was born Aug. 29, 1936, in the Panama Canal Zone while his father was stationed at a U.S. naval base.

There was never any question in the mind of THIS blogger.

I was born on a U.S. Military base in a foreign land to two natural born U.S. Citizens and we were there because my father was serving our country in the U.S. Military! It has driven me bonkers when my citizenship has been questioned because I was born in a foreign country! Even gov't agencies have questioned my citizenship before. In middle school, kids used to say, "You sure don't look like you're from another country." But grown-ups and agents of the gov't should know better. Good grief people.

So thanks to McCain, it's settled. (And now I'm over 35) So if any of you want to write me in, feel free. ;-)

The matriarch of a prominent San Antonio family was murdered last week. Yesterday at her funeral, her son offered to pay for the defense of her killer. I heard him interviewed on the local talk radio station yesterday afternoon and it was incredible. Their lawyers have told him he can't do that because of "conflict of interest", but he explained his reasoning. He said that he was following Jesus' teachings: loving his enemies, forgiving others, and doing unto the "least of these" as he would to Jesus. The radio host said, "Jesus is my Lord and Savior too, but all I would want is 5 minutes alone with the guy." "Yeah," Mr. Barrios said, "but you'd be doing it to Jesus."

It was incredible.

Viola Barrios' Family Offers To Pay Legal Fees For Her Accused Killer

Family and friends said their final goodbyes to Viola Barrios, owner of the famed Los Barrios Restaurant. Those attending her emotional funeral witnessed an amazing act of forgiveness.

Not only are the Barrios' forgiving the family who's son is charged with Viola's murder, they're now helping the Estrada's defend their son by offering to pay for his legal fees.

"The Estradas can't afford it, but the Barrios family can," Louis explained. "And we are asking Roy, Junior and Bobby, to defend Joey Estrada, Jr.

One of the attorneys Barrios wanted to defend Estrada said he cannot represent the teen.

"It would be a conflict of interest. It would be awkward. If Estrada ended up getting the death penalty, some would question whether the Barrios paid a lawyer to ensure that happened," said Roy Barrera, Sr., a lawyer.

Louis Barrios remembered his mother Viola in a tearful goodbye at her funeral Monday.

"My mother died Wednesday night/Thursday morning, and then I came to the conclusion that the person that loved me the most is gone. I cried like a baby," said Louis Barrios.

Although his heart was filled with sadness, the people who packed church soon found out it still had enough room for forgiveness.

"The Estrada family will always be a part of our family," Louis said.

Louis Barrios said the court fees to defend Joey Estrada, Jr. are expected to be more than $100,000.
Joey Estrada, Jr. is still in jail on a $1-million bond.

The 18-year-old was arrested Friday. He lived next door to barrios.

A court date for Estrada has not been set.

Here's a personal account from someone who went to the funeral.

What spoke to me, both literally and figuratively, was Louis Barrios, son of Viola. He spoke with deep passion and conviction in his faith in Christ-That is where the victory comes in...

Yesterday he went next door, to the home of Joey Estrada, his mother's murderer.

He went to extend a hand of forgiveness and prayer

But, then he went even further...he begged us through tears, to "please pray for Joey and his family. He didn't know what he was doing"

Read this for more details. It's an incredible story.

But Monday afternoon, Bobby Barrera said he and his brother had declined to take the case, deciding it would be a conflict of interest because of their relationship to Viola Barrios and her family.

Viola Barrios, 76, founder of Los Barrios Mexican Restaurant in 1979 and La Hacienda de los Barrios in 2004, was slain last week in her Northwest Side home. Her badly burned body, with “potential trauma” to her head, according to an arrest affidavit, was found in her bedroom, a trail of accelerant from her bed to the hallway.

On Friday, Estrada, a former athlete on Churchill's track team who grew up next door to Barrios, was charged with her slaying.

While Estrada remained jailed Monday on a $1 million bond, his parents attended the funeral of their son's alleged victim. Afterward, Louis Barrios and his sister Diana Barrios Trevino embraced Joe and Dorothy Estrada and invited them to sit with the Barrios family at the graveside service at San Fernando Cemetery.

There, beneath a bright morning sun, the siblings wrapped their arms around the weeping Estradas, holding their hands as Barrios' coffin was lowered.

“The Barrios family lost our mother. The Estrada family lost their son,” Louis Barrios said. “These were my mother's neighbors, my mother's friends. When they moved in next door six years ago, she greeted them with tamales. ... We need each other, we're united, we forgive him.” Forgiveness — and celebration of Barrios' life — were the recurrent themes during the services.


Because she was so quick to forgive, Louis Barrios told Bobby Barrera that the family does not want Estrada to face the death penalty, as Bexar County District Attorney Susan Reed suggested last week, saying at a Friday news conference that she would like to “string” up the suspect herself.

“As he put it, ‘I know it would be my mother's desire that this boy not be put to death,'” Barrera said.

On Monday, those who attended Viola Barrios' funeral instead focused on her life and the generous offer made by her son, however short-lived it was.

Speaking of 19th-century Russian author Leo Tolstoy, who gave his money to the poor, Mayor Phil Hardberger said, “It was truly an amazing, Tolstoyan gesture.”

“It shows something of the heart of our city, but it comes through the heart of her family, her teaching and her spirit,” he said.

Yolanda Arellano, executive director of the San Antonio Restaurant Association, who had earlier referred the matriarch's “love for her children, God and country,” said she was not surprised at Louis Barrios' gesture toward the Estrada family.

“He was his mother's son. She always had a big heart,” Arellano said.

I must say again that hearing Louis Barrios cite scripture about love and forgiveness in the face of his mother's murder was incredible thing.

Not that he needs a reason, but that our society can produce and accommodate this is essentially begging God to wipe us off the earth.

I'm not one for moral hand-wringing, and it's not like I don't know millions of babies have been murdered basically for convenience, but OH MY GOD.
When pro-choicers are appalled, you know you're sick.

That this person gets to keep doing this is proof God is merciful.

(HT: BHT)

I don't know how many of you saw the original soundbites of Jeremiah Wright's controversial statements from the pulpit. In doing research on Black Liberation Theology, for a presentation for my church, I looked up the clips on youtube to see them for myself. I found some that Wright's church wanted me to see.

Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago has posted a little more context as a way of response. Here are much bigger clips from which the controversial sound bites came. They want us to see the context. I think it's worth watching. If you want to understand this sort of thinking, I'd encourage you to take the time.

I don't do this to disparage, but if we want to understand, then we should listen and pay attention. This is how Black Liberation Theology responds to the world and reads the Bible. What flows out of the pulpit, is the natural product of the theology.

America's Chickens - This is the sermon preached the Sunday after 9-11-01


It makes sense if you understand that Liberation Theology views history and social wrongs as the primary emphasis of Scripture. Liberation theology teaches that salvation history is the story of the oppressed vs. the oppressor. And God is on the side of the oppressed. Liberation theology teaches that capitalist countries such as the U.S. do what they do militarily to keep poor people poor, and the rich people rich.

And like the prophet Amos, Liberation Theologians believe they must pronounce judgement on the nations that perpetuate social injustice and violence against the oppressed.

God CURSE America - because the Gov't wages war on the oppressed

Woman Bites Dog...Who Attacked Her Dog

Woman Bites Dog Who Attacked Her Dog
2 hours ago

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Amy Rice feared for her dog's life when a pit bull jumped over a fence into her yard and attacked her pooch. So she took matters into her own mouth.

Rice says she bit the pit bull on the nose Friday after trying to pull the dog's jaws off her Labrador retriever, Ella. The dog had jumped a fence to get into Rice's northeast Minneapolis yard, and Rice says she feared the pit bull would kill Ella.

"I didn't plan it, that's what happened. I broke the skin and had pit bull blood in my mouth," said Rice, 38. "I knew what happened, and I knew that it wasn't good."

The pit bull was quarantined Wednesday by Minneapolis Animal Control officers while rabies tests are being completed. Rice's doctor will determine whether she needs shots for rabies.

"I was sure that my dog was dying in my arms; it was horrible," Rice said.

Ella is recovering with staples and stitches to her head and a crushed ear canal, but she is afraid to go for walks, Rice said.

The Anchoress, cogent as always, nails it:

This 2008 election - and much of our electoral process - is already a two-ring circus; Rush is simply adding a third ring, and he’s perhaps also demonstrating how absurdly dishonest and vapid has it all become - the endless campaigning, maneuvering, manipulating and lying. And like a good capitalist he is turning a profit on the thing, besides. (If the “Operation Chaos” tee shirts, hats, etc are meant to support a charity, please let me know.)

So, I don’t think Limbaugh should “be stopped.” But I also don’t know that people should be giggling and guffawing over “Operation Chaos” without considering that — if the “operation” is rooted in a spirit of spiteful payback — it is bound to reap negative fruit. Moreover, I am old-fashioned enough to think of our vote is “a sacred trust” even if that is unsophisticated of me, even if others think vote manipulation is timely sport.

I keep thinking about the Russian Immigrant who looked forward to his first chance to vote in America, and told Gerard Vanderleun, “I will vote always for best, always” and about the people in Iraq who braved so much to hold their purple fingers in the air…and about the Iraqi and American dead who fought to give them that right.

And in thinking about them, I’m a bit ashamed of our three-ring circus and the casual menace which we are bringing to our own sacred process. They all deserve better than we’re giving them, right now.

[Emphasis mine].

I don't think adding a third ring (great metaphor, that) of absurdity to our current political circus is funny, cute, moral, or, on a purely pragmatic level, ultimately effective.

Plus, many of us in the conservative camp are also purportedly committed Christians. So why are we playing the role of the insurgent in the Democratic primaries? The answer "Well, they do it to us!" doesn't cut it for me, at least when said by someone who claims Jesus as Lord. It would make us pretty mad if the Democrats were mucking up Republican primaries, especially on this scale.

Sowing to this wind has a chance of reaping a whirlwind of bitterness, hatred and revenge in our political system for years ahead. Think about it: if the plan "works" and McCain wins, the next election is going to be even nastier, since we've, by our actions, disavowed any rules of fair play. It could also colossally backfire, and Hillary could win. And there's only one good thing about that: all Limbaugh's chuckling acolytes might gain a new, more sober perspective on how stupid Limbaugh's plan was the whole time, and perhaps next time fewer of them would be willing to play along.

“So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets." - Jesus

After Mr. and Mrs. Obama released their tax returns, the press quickly noticed that, between 2000 and 2004, they gave less than one percent of their income to charity, far lower than the national average. Their giving rose to a laudable five percent in 2005 and six percent in 2006, with the explosion of their annual income to near $1 million, and the advent of Mr. Obama’s national political aspirations (representing a rare case in which political ambition apparently led to social benefit).

According to an Obama spokesman, the couple’s miserly charity until 2005 “was as generous as they could be at the time,” given their personal expenses. In other words, despite an annual average income over the period of about $244,000, they simply could not afford to give anything meaningful . . .

In 2006, another wealthy political couple with significant book royalties was Mr. and Mrs. Cheney, who had a combined income of $8.8 million, largely due to Mrs. Cheney’s books and the couple’s investment income. Just how much did the Cheneys give to charity from their bonanza? A measly 78 percent of their income, or $6.9 million. (No, that is not a misprint.)

(HT: BHT)

James Cone is the founder and still the main proponent. He is professor at Union Theolgical Seminary in New York, which is one the most liberal seminaries in the U.S.

Black Liberation Theology is Liberation Theology applied to the opression experienced by African-Americans.

Cone wrote: “Black history is recovering a past deliberately destroyed by slave masters, an attempt to revive old survival symbols and create new ones. Black power is an attempt to shape our persent economic, social and political existence according to those actions that destroy the oppressor’s hold on black flesh. Black theology places our past and present actions toward black liberation in a theological context, seeking to destroy alien gods and to create value-structures according to the God of black freedom” (Black Theology and Black Liberation, “1085)

If Liberation Theology defines itself as the oppressor vs. the oppressed, and God is on the side of the oppressed, then Black Liberation Theology defines itself as White Vs. Black, and God is on the side of the Blacks. Yes, it is a Christian version of the Black Power movement of the 1960's.

Black theology is theology committed to liberating black people and defines itself as locked into a battle with white racism. Our religion, what we call orthodoxy, black liberation theologians call “white religion” or “whitianity” or “Christianity”. - Evangelical Dictionary of Theology edited by Walter Elwell

This view of Christianity as inherently racist may explain to you some of Jeremiah Wright's response to Hannity in the video clip I posted at the Liberation Theology post.

They certainly have some evidence in their favor. Early slave owners did distort Christianity so that the existing relationship between slave and master would not be challenged. Many racists used the Bible to justify their evil.
And in the church, blacks found the only place that they could define themselves, rather than being defined by society. Even now Cone points to all the portayals of Jesus as white, and says, "If they can do that, why can't we?"
The Black Muslim movement with emphasis on black pride and black power had a lot of influence in the 1960's. And so James Cone invented and developed "Black Liberation Theology."

Background and Beliefs
Like Liberation Theology, Black Liberation Theology teaches that God acts in history to save people, and that salvation means far more than just spiritual, but it must also include economic, physical, political and social liberation. They look at the Exodus as the model of how God works, and of God's mission on earth. Jesus' "failure" on the cross is seen as God identifying with blacks. Cone says that in order to understand the cross, we must understand the lynching of blacks.

Cone quotes Karl Barth “God always takes his stand unconditionally and passionately on this side alone, against those who already enjoy right and privilege and on behalf of those who are denied it and deprived of it.” (Black Theology and Black Power, 45)

Cone finds suport in Psalm 10:17-18

You hear, O LORD, the desire of the afflicted; you encourage them, and you listen to their cry, defending the fatherless and the oppressed, in order that man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more.

And also in Psalm 72:12

For he will deliver the needy who cry out, the afflicted who have no one to help.

And because he sees blacks as the oppressed and the whites as the oppressors, Cone is able to say, "God is black."

Like Liberation Theology, Luke 4:18 is the foundational scripture.

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed...

Cone also points to Matthew 11:19 where he says that Jesus knows how to identify with the Black experience because he too has been falsely accused and villified.

The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and "sinners." ' But wisdom is proved right by her actions."

And of course there is also Luke 7:22 -

So he replied to the messengers, "Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy[a] are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.

And so Black Liberation Theologians see Jesus' mission as one of liberation. Because God is identified with liberating the poor and the oppressed, then in the 20th century he would be identified with blackness. That is where God is today, they say. And obedience to God requires identification with the poor and oppressed, i.e. blackness.

The Great Satan – from an article sympathetic to Black theology

“Black Liberation Theology teaches that In the New Testament, Jesus comes into the world to destroy the works of Satan. If the preceding identification of the struggle of Jesus and that of African-Americans seeking liberation is true, then there must also be a Satan in the contemporary picture. Black Theology does not get bogged down in quaint personifications of Satan but sees him at work in the powers and principalities of this world that would enslave and demean human beings. And the most demonic of these powers in the black experience is that of racism.

Cone writes: "Theologically, Malcolm X was not far wrong when he called the white man 'the devil.' The white structure of this American society, personified in every racist, must be at least part of what the New Testament meant by demonic forces...Ironically, the man who enslaves another enslaves himself...To be free to do what I will in relation to another is to be in bondage to the law of least resistance. This is the bondage of racism. Racism is that bondage in which whites are free to beat, rape, or kill blacks. About thirty years ago it was acceptable to lynch a black man by hanging him from a tree; but today whites destroy him by crowding him into a ghetto and letting filth and despair put the final touches on death." http://www.wfu.edu/~matthetl/perspectives/twentyseven.html

In his article, "An Investigation of Black Liberation Theology," Dr. H. Wayne House wrote, "black theology (and liberation theology in general) seeks to speak to 'this-world' problems, rather than 'other-world' issues; to concrete circumstances, rather than abstract thought; to the sinfulness of man's plight in a ghetto rather than sin in man's heart; and to a savior who delivers man from earthly slavery, rather than a Savior who saves man from spiritual bondage. This is black liberation theology in a word."

(Note: Dr. House's article originally appeared in Bibliotheca Sacra, the theological journal of Dallas Theological Seminary. I first found the article when doing research on this last week. Since then it has been taken down. Numerous other bloggers have linked to it, but now their links are dead. If you can find it, read it, and tell me where to find it again! It's Excellent.)

(Further Note: More posts on this subject will be coming...)

Sean Hannity didn't know last year, and neither did the rest of America, even though Jeremiah Wright tried to explain it.



What really bugs me about this clip is that Hannity never seems to listen. And he certainly doesn't answer Rev. Wright's question. Why didn't he just say, "No, I don't know what Liberation Theology is, and neither does the rest of America. Could you please explain it?" What a missed opportunity!

Now we're paying attention a year later because of some clips from his sermons show up on youtube and the news stations and commentators went nuts over Rev. Wright's "controversial" statements.

But how many of us really understand where his preaching and beliefs come from? He tried to tell us. So let's belatedly, give him a hearing. Let's do as he says and learn what Liberation Theology is, in order to better understand where he's coming from.

To understand Black Liberation Theology, you have to understand Liberation Theology.

Liberation Theology (One of my main sources was the "Evangelical Dictionary of Theology" by Walter Elwell)

It is more of a movement than a systematic theology. Since its origin in Latin America in the mid-20th century it has been applied to blacks, feminists, asians, hispanics and Native Americans.

It was born in Latin America, and what came from there is the origin and model for all versions of Liberation Theology. It was primarily articulated by a man named Gustavo Gutierrez. It was heavily influenced by Marxism, and some have even said that it is a Christianized form of Marxism.

After Vatican II in 1965, Latin American Roman Catholic leaders turned to Liberation theology. Latin American Liberation theologians say that their continent has been victimized by colonialism, imperialism and multinational corporations. They say that Latin America is dependent on economic decisions made in capitalist countries like the U.S. and the U.K. So to perpetuate this economic exploitation, liberation theologians argue that powerful capitalist countries, give military and economic support to certain political regimes supportive of the economic status quo. They read history in a certain way. They read their newspapers in a certain way.

Liberation Theology was originally Latin American and Roman Catholic. Their views were rooted in history and culture. They saw what we call orthodoxy as being too individualistic. What about Social Injustice? What about Poverty? These are the questions they asked. They see a message of salvation that doesn't also include economic, social, and physical salvation as incomplete.

Method- defined by Gutierez as “critical reflection on historical praxis” Liberation Theologians say that theology should be immersed in your own intellectual and sociopolitical history. To them, Theology is not a system of timeless truths, but a changing exercise in social analysis. So new theological truth comes out of a given historical situatuion.

Marxism had a heavy influence on Liberation Theology with its teachings of class warfare. History, and the world, and the Bible are viewed as the chronic struggle of the Opressor v. The Oppressed. And of course, God is on the side of the oppressed. So that's where theology should be.

Liberation theology turns to the Bible. They point to Scriptures that show God identifying with the poor. And so communion with God is equated with fighting for the poor, identifying with them and sharing their fate. God is identified with the suffering.

Based on Luke 4:16-21 – which is based on Isaiah 61:1.

16He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read. 17The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:
18"The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
19to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

20Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, 21and he began by saying to them, "Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing."

This is Jesus announcing his ministry. Liberation Theologians see this as the foundational text of the whole Bible and their theology. These verses are the lense through which they read the rest of Scripture.

To them salvation means rescuing the poor. And sin is oppressing them.

So Liberation theologians teach that orthodox theology manipulates God in favor of Capitalistic social structure. What you and I call Orthodox Christianity, they call the religion of the oppressor designed to keep the oppressed down.

They emphasize God’s immanence over transecendence. To them God is worthless if he is not immersed in the fate of the oppressed. God is found in history. God is a crucified and suffering God who identifies with the poor.

The cross is primarily seen as the event in which God identifies with those who suffer and are "crucified" everyday.

So salvation is equated with the process of liberation from oppression and injustice.

Sin is defined in terms of man’s inhumanity to man.

Liberation theology equates loving your neighbor with loving God. They are virtually indistinguishable in liberation theology.

Israels’ liberation from Egypt is the prototypes for the contemporary struggle for liberation.

To the Liberation Theologian, Church and the world can’t be segregated.

Jesus’ death is not seen as a vicarious offering on behalf of mankind. Rather he exemplifies the suffering God experiences when anyone is oppressed.

As is typical in false teaching, they have some good points, but they go too far. Sin is real. And we need to be saved from it. They see only the oppressed as needing a savior. The Bible does not teach that the poor are the embodiment of God in today’s world. The Bible teaches that God is transcendent. And while he cares about the poor, that life with God does not only mean whether or not your poor. They seem to miss all of Jesus' emphasis on eternal life, on storing your treasures for the next life.

It politicizes the gospel. It is a social gospel. But it is not the Gospel.

For those of you who wonder how so many liberal churches can preach politics, there it is. To them religion is politics. Because Jesus came to save the oppressed now.

Later I'll show you how these ideas were applied to the Black experience in America, and resulted in something called "Black Liberation Theology".

Nerves of steel, that one.

HT: Huffington Post

They might have found D.B. Cooper's parachute.

The parachute -- similar to the one Cooper jumped with -- was unearthed earlier this month after a Clark County man plowed part of the rural property he's owned for nearly a decade, said Larry Carr, the lead agent on the Cooper case. The man's children found the parachute when they were playing and Carr, who is based in Seattle, retrieved it from southwest Washington.

"If D.B. Cooper had pulled his chute not long after that jump, he would have landed in that area," Carr said. "Is this D.B. Cooper's parachute? We don't know yet" . . .

Carr said Cooper's backup parachute was sewn shut, and the working one he jumped with was a Navy-issue NB6. But Carr can't find identifying markings on the worn parachute or the container in which it was packed. He is hoping someone with expert knowledge of NB6 parachutes can assist in the effort.

"If this canopy can be traced to an NB6 backpack, it will start looking pretty good," Carr said.

Most investigators surmise Cooper died in the frigid wild, perhaps even in his jump. But!

None of the $200,000 ever made it into circulation, though $5,800 worth of the frayed bills were found along the Columbia River in 1980. And that creates another complication for FBI investigators.

Carr said that if Cooper landed where the parachute was found, it would be impossible for the ransom money to end up where it did by natural means.

"No matter what you do with this case," Carr said, "the mystery deepens."

From a New York Times interview with John Hagee:

NYT: Two years ago, you founded Christians United for Israel , an influential lobbying group that has won accolades from many Jewish leaders.

JH: I’m trying to do something beneficial for the state of Israel and the Jewish people. It’s the right thing to do. If you take the Jewish contribution away from Christianity, there would be no Christianity.

NYT: That’s a touching sentiment, but some are concerned that the Zionism of American evangelicals stems from self-interest. Isn’t your involvement in Israel based on a desire to speed the second coming of Jesus?

JH: Our support of Israel has nothing to do with any kind of “end times” Bible scenario.

HT: Glenn Lucke

Hillary is a liar.

Or if you prefer, she "merely" told a lie.

May today be a day of resurrection for you; new life, renewed faith, new joy. Jesus Christ is risen.

He is risen indeed!

The celebration continues, all around the world.
Read the rest of this entry . . .

“Eleven o’clock Sunday morning is the most segregated hour, and Sunday school is still the most segregated school of the week” – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In his speech yesterday, Barack Obama referred to these words. At the time that Dr. King uttered them it was true. Is it still?

All this prologue (in the post below) brings me to the main story:

While in Nashville attending seminary, my wife and I were members at a small white church,Hickory Hollow Baptist Church. We had a nice building and a good location. A local black congregation, Simeon Baptist Church, was looking for a place to meet. They were a SBC church and their pastor was an employee at the Baptist Sunday School Board. Their pastor and our pastor really made a connection with each other. They asked if they could rent our building on Sundays. The proposal was that they would have Sunday School at 10:30, right when we were finishing SS and going to church, they would arrive and go to class right as we were leaving class. Then they had church at noon, right as we were leaving the sanctuary. So when we would be going out, they would be coming in.

It was then that I learned what had really happened. When their pastor approached our pastor about renting our space, our pastor asked if our churches could merge. Our pastor offered to resign, and their pastor would become the pastor of the combined group. (It was a sincere offer.) Simeon Baptist rejected it. They wanted their own identity. So our church approved the rental unanimously.

We were excited about it. Our two churches got a long wonderfully. We hired a pianist that happened to be one of their members. When our pastor was absent, their pastor would preach for us and vice versa. Our churches had fellowships together and joint outreach projects. Some of their members would attend our services and some of our members attended theirs. Their drumset got moved to the front of our sanctuary, and though we never used it, it sat there in all of it's gleaming red glory, silent, every Sunday morning. And we knew it was going to get loud when we left. :)

It was a great thing. One that both of our churches were happy with. Our sign out front had both churches listed. My only regret was the same as our pastor's, I wished we could worship together. But it was made clear to me from some of my friends in Simeon that they didn't want that. They wanted to maintain their own identity, and they didn't want to have to tone down their worship.

Somehow the editor/writer of the Nashville newspaper's religion section found out about our arrangement. He scheduled a day that he would attend both services and interview members of both churches. Both churches were so excited. We really felt like God was doing a wonderful thing, and that we had a mutually beneficial, God-glorifying relationship.

The reporter came. He saw. He interviewed. He left. He wrote.

Front page headline of the Religion section next week read,

"Segregated on Sunday"

We were crushed. The article emphasized the fact that though it was the 90's we were still segregated. It was a negative piece. And though the individuals interviewed had only positive things to say, the reporter managed to make it look like our attitude was that the black church was good enough to pay us rent, but not good enough to worship with us white folks.

It hurt the members of both churches. We were outraged. Some wrote letters to the editor.

It still hurts me. What I remember is that the white folks wanted to merge. But I also understood the concern of Simeon. Would it ever really be "their church"? I respected their choice to remain seperate. And I rejoiced in our relationship. But a reporter had to find the negative. He had to point out a racial divide where much had gone on to bring racial reconciliation at our church.

I suppose it's still like that. As I read Obama's words about how special he felt in his black church, I was reminded that for many blacks, their church is still a special place, and they want it to remain that way. Though Obama would want whites to be welcomed at his church (and I'm sure they are), he would never want it to cease to be a black church. So in that sense, I think the segregation on Sunday will continue for a long, long time.

Obama had some good points in his speech. The media does benefit from and look for racial conflict, and they just make it worse.

In his speech, Obama referred often to "the black community" and "the white community". Will that ever end? Will there ever be a time when we are an "American Community"? Will there ever be a time that to refer to "the black community" will be just as silly sounding as "the red headed community"?

Part of what I learned from my experience with Simeon & Hickory Hollow is that the answers aren't so simple. Blacks have a community, they have an identity, one forged in hardship in persecution. You can't just expect them to give that up. Though I do long for a day when we no longer use the word "them" in reference to any racial makeup.

I don't think Obama used Dr. King's words in quite the same way that Dr. King meant them. In Dr. King's day, white churches were keeping blacks out while preaching racial reconciliation. Dr. King was challenging white churches to practice what they preach. Reading Obama's excerpt from his first book that he quoted in this speech, it seems that Obama chose his church partly because it was segregated, not in spite of it. That it was by African-Americans for African-Americans was important to him. I respect that. But that's the reason for the "segregation".

But race is difficult. Obama's race is irrelevant to me. And I wish it were irrelevant to everyone. But to the black person his or her own race isn't irrelevant. It's who they are. And so we as a society and as churches seem to be embracing racial differences at the same time that we repudiate them. It's weird. It's schizophrenic. It's complicated. And pardon the pun, it's not a black and white issue. There's a lot of gray.

For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician’s own failings.

And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright’s sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning.- Barack Obama on 3-18-08

You people know a lot. So what I share here may not be news to you. But I had some experiences in the great city of Nashville that illuminate the words above for me, so in case it helps, I'll share them here.

My wife and I lived there for four years. It was for me an exposure to the black community that I had never had before. I was brought up in a family where race was a non-issue. I had friends of different races growing up, and it was never an issue for me. But then...the bubble got shattered.

I moved to San Antonio, Texas in the 9th grade. And there weren't very many black people at my school. So they all ate at the same table. Together. As a small community. And not one white person ate with them. I hated that. "Why are they seperate?" I wondered.

I also noticed that many of the Mexicans who went to our school (this is not a racial aspersion, they were citizens of Mexico) all sat together. I managed to breach that bubble. I don't know how, but they let me sit with them. They became my friends, where I otherwise didn't have any. I'm still grateful to them for that. (That's how I learned dirty words in Spanish, but that story will never be told. :)

After graduation, I moved to Waco, TX to go to Baylor University. Talk about segregated. There was a part of Waco that was poor, and populated mostly by blacks. It made me sad. It made me start to wonder about the sorts of things that Obama talked about in his speech. Why with segregation gone, did poverty and segregation in practice still seem to exist?

After graduating from Baylor I moved to Nashville, TN. I had the priviledge of working in downtown Nashville at the Baptist Book Store. Oh, man was that awesome. I got to meet and build relationships with members, deacons and pastors of black churches. They were probably 50% of my customers. From some relationships that developed I grew to have a deep love and respect for the black church and the black community.

One thing I learned is that it's different. And I'm not talking about worship style. We all know that. The differences are far more profound. In the black church, there is a sense of community that I'm not sure that white folks can ever fully understand. There is a great deal of power and authority given to the officers of the church. The ushers, deacons, Pastor's aids, and associate pastors were so important to their churches. It was interesting to me that people with these offices often came to me looking for guidebooks. They wanted handbooks on "how to be an usher" or "pastor's aid" or whatever. These kind of questions never came from white churches.

There was a certain seriousness and formality that went along with these positions. So much that people wanted us to use their title when we entered their names into the computer. "Usher Jones" or "Deacon Smith" or the like. For a long time I didn't understand it.

I also didn't understand the pastor's aid. These are folks in the church who serve the pastor. Oh, man do I wish white churches had these folks. :) Sometimes they would pick up his dry cleaning, pick up his kids from school, and assist him in any and every way. Black preachers hardly ever came into the store alone. They almost always had an aid or an assistant with them. And it was a big deal.

I still didn't understand all this until I spent some time in a preaching class taught by a black professor who had the kindness to explain the black church to us ignorant white preacher boys.

You see, going all the way back to slavery, and even up through the 1960's blacks were kept out of society, the white man's world. The only place they had that was their own was church. And there safe within the walls of the black church, they could be honest. They could express anger about racism. They could support one another. They could ascend to some level of social recognition. This is part of the reason "church officers" are so important. For a long time this was all many blacks had, their positions in church.

I also came to learn that in the black community the pastor was important, real important. He was much more than the guy who preached on Sunday. He had a role that is far beyond that of the typical white pastor. He was community leader. Social advocate. I remember one of my black preacher friends saying to me that he had just come from an apartment complex where one of his church members was about to be thrown out for not paying rent. He told the landlord to give the member more time. He didn't ask, he told. Why? "Because I'm the pastor," he said to me. "Now when do you white preachers do things like that?" I'm not able to remember his exact words after that, but he explained that a black pastor has an authority in the community that extends far beyond the walls of the church.

“. . . anger in some of Reverend Wright’s sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.”

- Barack Obama, in a speech given March 18, 2008

I'm not an Obama supporter, and I can't imagine voting for someone so committed to abortion rights and the litany of other standard Democratic party platforms.

But I think people are wrong who believe the current flap about his pastor's statements from the pulpit will somehow "sink" his candidacy. I don't think it necessarily helps him, but if he loses the nomination or the general election, it won't be primarily because of this.

And, regarding his statement above, I think there's a lot of truth to it.

Thoughts?

E-mail forwards are the bane of my existence. Urban legends, fearmongering about missing children and Democratic politicians who want to eat them, political rabble rousing, mushy stories about little kids in Sunday School or grandfathers and ice cream cones, jingoistic screeds masquerading as patriotism, etc etc etc.
I hatessss them, my preciousss. And I always feel all Gollumy when I ask a relative or friend to:
a) not include me in their send to file for such things
b) at the very least place me in the BCC section of their e-mail's "To" field so all the hundreds of people they know but I don't won't have my e-mail address, or
c) do some quick research and learn that the story they're forwarding is not true.

I can kinda-sorta understand the sentiment that provokes one to pass these things along.
But for the life of me I cannot put myself in the brainpattern of the person who falsifies details or begins the lie. What's the compulsion?

Check this out.
This ginormous mountain lion was struck by a car in Arizona. The good folks at Snopes document several variations of the email forward in which people change the details to say the mountain lion was found in Arkansas, Virginia, etc.

Why? What's the point?
What rational person takes an e-mail and purposefully changes the place names so as to mislead others for something so stupid?
I get white lies, I get fudging details on "big fish" stories, I get lying for profit . . . I don't get the person who changes "in Tempe between 1st and 3rd Avenue" to "in Jacksonville between 4th and 5th Street."