Elvis Christmas

O come, all ye faithful
Joyful and triumphant
O come ye, o come ye to Bethlehem
Come and behold him
Born the king of angels
O come let us adore Him
O come let us adore Him
O come let us adore Him
Christ the Lord

Sing choirs of angels
Sing in exaltation
Oh sing all ye citizens
Of heaven above
Glory to God, Glory in the highest
O come let us adore Him
O come let us adore Him
O come let us adore Him
Christ the Lord

Powell Butte Nature Park

Go Tell it on the Mountain...

I always mean to do some real writing in here.  I construct elaborate essays in my head when I lay down in bed for the night.    I write out introductions.  I have extensive supporting arguments.  I wrap it up all nice and neat.  I always mean  to use all of those professional writing skills that I learned in my 7 years of college.  I always mean to do alot of things.

We went out with some friends on Halloween.  Some folks from Pittsfield recently moved out here.  A couple they are.  One of them is in a band.  They played  a "party" at a restaurant.  It was a good and festive time.  The opening act was an extremely talented one man band.  He played several different instruments, sang a mean tune and put an a great show.  I was one of the few that did not dress up.  People like to dress up to disparage the religous.  Nuns, priests and even the pope were out in full force.

There is a course in front of the Supreme Court right now that recently caught my attention.   At issue is whether a religous artifact can be placed in a public park.  A town somewhere in the midwest allowed a private entity to erect a monument to the Ten Commandments.  The leaders of an obscure new-age religion sued because they were not allowed to erect their own monument.

I received a company wide email at work today.  They are encouraging everyone to decorate our desks for the holidays.  We were given ideas such as trees, boxes, garland, string and more.  But we are not allowed to have anything that implies a religion.  No crosses and no nativity scenes.

I am pretty disappointed that Proposition 8 passed in California.  The voters of California should have never had the opportunity to vote on such a thing in the first place.  I support efforts to overturn the vote.  I do not intend to lay out the argument for such a thing, but I do support a federal ruling banning states from barring homosexuals to marry.

I have been reading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis.  There is a great chapter in there on Christian Marriage.   I think that his argument on divorce is relevant to this topic.

A great many people seem to think that if you are a Christian yourself you should try to make divorce difficult for every one.  I do not think that.  At least I know I should be very angry if the Mohammeans tried to prevent the rest of us from drinking wine.  My own view is that the Churches should frankly recognise that the majority of the British people are not Christians and, therefore, cannot be expected to live Christian lives.  There ought to be two distinct kinds of marriage: one governed by the State with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the Church with rules enforced by her on her own members.  The distinction ought to be quite sharp, so that a man knows which couples are married in a Christian sense and which are not.

We have been trying to plan a wedding.  We are really not sure what we are going to do.  Weddings cost money.  Weddings cost alot of money.  Neither of us are willing to put much money into it.  We have very little savings.  What little we do have we wish to put towards a house someday.  I prefer to just get it over with.  We have toyed around with the idea of just doing a small thing and having a party in Pittsfield next summer.  A party, even a nicely put on one, is far cheaper than a wedding.  But we shall see.

Also in Mere Christianity is a great quote on love.  If we do have a slightly more formal wedding than what I would like I plan to have it as one of our readings.

Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing.  There are many things below it, but there are also things above it.  You cannot make it the basis of a whole life.  It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling.  Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all.  Knowledge can last, principles can lst, habits can last; but feelings come and go.  And in fact, whatever people say, the state called 'being in love' usually does not last.  If the old fairy-tale ending 'They lived happily ever after' is taken to mean 'They felt for the next fifty years exactly as they felt the day before they were married', then it says what probably never was nor ever would be true, and would be highly undesirable if it were.  Who could bear to live in that excitement for even five years?  What would become of your work, your appetite, your sleep, your friendships?  But, of course, ceasing to be 'in love' need not mean ceasing to love.  Love in this second sense - love as distinct from 'being in love' - is not merely a feeling.  It is a deep unity, reinforced by the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God.  They can have this love for each other even at those moments when they do not like each other; as you love yourself even when you do not like yourself.  They can retain this love even when each would easily, if they allowed themselves, be 'in love' with someone else.  'Being in love' first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise.  It is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it.

It is a good book.  He lays out, in very plain language, a layman's understanding of Christianity.  But it is not without faults.  Most importantly, he has refused to take God on his word when it comes to murder.  He makes excuses for human behavior.  He suggests that God does the same.  He believes that there is a distinction between war and the death penalty with other forms of murder.  He believes, as far as I understand his argument, that God also recognizes this distinction.  Leo Tolstoy dealt with this false dichotomy quite well in "The Kingdom of God is Within You".

Obama was elected to be the next President of The United States of America.  I was happy to hear so.  I did not think that I would see a black man elected to that office in my lifetime.  I do not expect a terrible lot out of his presidency.  I do not expect him to be able to turn the path of this country around.  He is an extremely intelligent and thoughtful man.  But let me say that you can tell that he thinks deeply about things before he talks or acts.  I can respect that.

Laura visited this weekend.  I will post some pictures the next time around.  Suffice it to say that we had a great time while she was out here.  It was alot of fun.

I baked some chocolate chip cookies tonight.  They were delicious.

Psalm 10

LORD, why are you standing so far away?

Why do you hide when there is trouble?

In his pride the wicked man tries to catch helpless people

I hope that wicked people catch themselves with their bad plans!

The wicked boasts about what he wants.

He says good things about those that want more than is fair

He says very bad things about the LORD.

In his pride, the wicked does not look for God.

He will not even think of God.

Everything that the wicked does always works well.

He puts the rules of God far from him

He laughs at the people that do not like him.

He says to himself, "There will be no trouble for me

Nothing bad will ever happen to me or to my children".

His mouth makes bad promises.

It is full of words that are not true.

He says that he will do very bad things to people.

There is evil on his tongue.

He hides behind the bushes near the villages.

He watches in secret for people to hurt.

He jumps out and murders people that have done nothing wrong.

He lies like a lion under the cover of a bush.

He waits to catch someone that is helpless.

He does catch him and takes him away in his net.

He beats the helpless man.

The helpless man fails and falls under the stronger man.

He says to himself, "God forgot.

He hid his face. He never saw what happened".

Rise up, O God! Lift up your hand.

Do not forget the helpless people.

Why does the wicked man say such bad things about God?

Why does he think, 'God will not do anything about it?'

See it all, God, all the trouble,

all the oppressed people.

Decide what to do about it.

The helpless puts his trust in you.

You give help to the fatherless.

The arm of the wicked and evil man . . . break it (LORD)!

Tell him to explain what he has done.

He thought that you would not discover it!

The LORD will always be king.

The nations will not remain in his land for evermore.

You hear, LORD, what oppressed people want.

You listen when they pray. You give them something to hope for.

You care for the fatherless and the oppressed.

People from the earth will not frighten the poor again.