Puffs

A year, or two, ago I had a Lawrence High School alum ask how I came up with subject matter for writing ‘Puffs.”

I told him that I seldom had a plan from week to week, but something always presented itself. This past week was no different. Sometimes subject matter comes from sources you least expect.

This week, for example, I was reading a letter from the Archbishop of Denver and there was a lot there to consider, but one little sentence caught my attention and I wanted to forward his thoughts to our readers as well.

This Catholic bishop spoke the obvious, if you stop to think about it, and I guess it was two sentences as follows: “We no longer live in a culture influenced by the faith. We have entered a new era in which the Church must recover and adopt an apostolic mindset to be effective in sharing Jesus Christ with a world that has lost its sense of purpose and believes it can accomplish the impossible task of saving itself.”

The entire article was great but the few words that really caught my attention were:“a world that has lost its sense of purpose and believes it can accomplish the impossible task of saving itself.”

That little phrase:“task of saving itself,” is what I got stuck on. What I got out of it was that most governments (not just in the U. S.) believe it is their job to correct all inequities in their area, thus“saving itself.”

We seldom hear governments talk about: “we’ll see how that works out.” They always have a plan to correct all the injustices they encounter.

You know what . . . sometimes those plans just don’t work out.

In the U. S. both the Republicans and the Democrats sometime fall short and then other groups we don’t always know about offer their remedies to save the world, and, they don’t do any better.

In recent years the most obvious contrasts has come between the Republican and the Democratic parties.

There are many examples of these differences. However, the most important difference is the matter of life and death for us humans that comes even before birth. It comes about in the matter of abortions (also at the end of life for those of old age).

The Liberals (who are most often identified as Democrats) have no trouble wanting to “kill” human babies before they are born. They seem to suggest that babies are the cause of some of our problems (such as causing the mother problem after problem with employment or being able to support a bigger family) and their answer to “save” the world is simply “kill” the baby and we’re all better off. Republicans seem to admit that problems can arise when a new baby arrives on the scene. However, they seldom (if ever) suggest that killing that new baby is the answer to solving whatever problems may arise. More sensible answers are adoptions and assistance to the family in raising that child.

Considering that 2022 is an election year here in the U. S. of A., I suggest it is time to take the time to know just what political candidates think about abortions. To me this is an overriding questions for all elections. I have always thought that if a person cannot support the ‘Right to Life’ of an unborn person, how can I trust that person with other issues that come up on the performance of his duties.

It makes no difference if that person wants to be a U. S. senator, or a member of a local school board, if they cannot think clearly on the matter of life or death, how will they think clearly on other matters, like suggesting first graders in school should be taught “Gender Identity.” As if they understood what that meant.

Another example of the Democrats trying to save itself and American as well, deals with our American idea of “Freedom of the Press.”

Yes, I support this idea and I think we do enjoy this concept . . . up to a point.

What happens when the majority of the press doesn’t believe in the concept which gives them their existence?

The following information comes from ‘American Action News.’

“In November 2020, the Media Research Center commissioned The Polling Company to survey 1,750 Biden voters in seven swing states (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin). A massive 45.1 percent of Biden voters polled said they were “unaware of the financial scandal enveloping Biden and his son, Hunter,” adding that “full awareness of the Hunter Biden scandal would have led 9.4 percent of Biden voters to abandon the Democratic candidate.”

“And it’s this 9.4 percent change that could have been hugely consequential when we consider Biden’s winning margins in six of these swing states. Biden won Arizona by 0.3 percent, Georgia by 0.23 percent, Michigan by 2.8 percent, Nevada by 2.4 percent, Pennsylvania by 1.2 percent and Wisconsin by 0.63 percent. A swing of 9.4 percent would have handed each of these states to former President Donald Trump, giving him 79 additional electoral votes.”

The national media (mostly owned and controlled by Liberals) seems to be Democrat in nature and they decided to “Save the World” by not giving out the information on Hunter Biden and his father. The results is seen in the ‘Russia-Ukraine war; high inflation in the U. S.; a southern border that has disappeared and causing the U. S. to change from being an oil exporter to an oil importer. All this because the Democrats was trying to “save itself.”

It is true that Republicans have also made mistakes, they have done more good than bad. I suggest that we consider the statement of one of the writers in the early U. S. He contended that the U. S. Constitution was written for a Christian nation. It does indeed seem that we no longer live in a culture influenced by the faith (no matter what faith that is).

This whole idea that we have to save ourselves via one of our political parties, or the U. S. Court system sometimes comes down to a laughable event.

In Sunday’s newspaper there was an article about a federal judge’s action in New York. For the background, you have to remember that a number of years ago, a federal judge rules that the “Boy’s Scouts” of America could not exclude girls from their organization. (This was a form of discrimination, according to the court.)

Well, just recently another federal court judge decided that the Girl’s Scouts claims that the Boy Scouts created marketplace confusion and damaged their recruitment efforts by using words like “Scouts” and “Scouting” in recruitment drives.

Yes, I believe we do have to make efforts to correct errors and deficiencies in society. However, they have to be made from a Christian point of view and, maybe, they may not solve the entire problem, but they cannot be solved by excluding most Christian philosophies however small and seemly unimportant they may be.

A O

I only wish the task of “saving ourselves” would be as easy as the problem a ‘Sign’ company had when it delivered signs to the maternity ward of their community’s hospital that said: “Free Delivery.”

A O