The lyrics to a Caedmon's Call song are "This world
has nothing for me and this world has
everything." That's powerful stuff for a Christian,
because it says that even though we can be very
frustrated that we don't see the characteristics
of God's kingdom in this world, it's all we have for
now. And we have to make the best of it while
we're on this side of heaven.
The following thoughts were inspired by this awful letter to the editor of the Columbus Dispatch:
I feel the need to remind Mary Anne Bricker (letter, Jan. 17) that, according to the Constitution of the
United States, the Supreme Court is, indeed, higher than the Supreme Being where matters of law are
concerned. The Supreme Court must address the legal issue at hand, not an individual's moral issue.
The Supreme Court does not answer to God's law but to our Constitution and to our laws. If Bricker
would like to live in a country where the courts answer to God's law, perhaps she should move to a
country ruled by Islamic law. Would she be willing to live by God's law then? There are many women
living lives of repression in countries ruled by God's law. In the United States, women have a legal right to have an abortion and women can believe in that legal
right, for the time being, because the Supreme Court says they can. When the Supreme Court starts
making legal decisions based on God's law, where will we go next? Shall we decide which of the many
Christian religions will be the "official'' religion of our country? Seems to me that we have the
Constitution to prevent the rule of God's law, not to enforce it.
We, as individuals, each answer to God in our own way. When choosing whether to have or not have an
abortion, a woman must make that difficult decision based upon her own moral code. At that time, she
must answer to God's law in her own personal relationship with God. We live in a country where we are
free to develop that relationship without interference from the government. It is not the Supreme Court's
role to decide what that relationship should mean. It is the Supreme Court's role to uphold the
Constitution. Can you understand that?
Yvonne J. Jacobs
Columbus
The thing people don't get is that to most pro-lifers,
the only issue is killing a person=wrong. They don't
care who's pro-death; they don't care about "women's rights"
to kill a fetus.
Pro-deathers generally don't want to hear other opinions
and risk having their minds changed, but the best thing I
can say to you if you're willing to listen is we are all
happier if we do unto others as we do have them do unto
us. Since fetuses are people, this included them too.
Ask yourself, "Would I have wanted my mother to abort me?"
Then form an opinion on abortion.
By the way, the only scenario about which I'd change my
abortion views is that of rape. If a woman is raped and
gets pregnant, it's perfectly understandable that she
would want to abort the baby. A child should be conceived
with two loving, responsible parents, and that wouldn't
be the case in a rape.
I wish pro-deathers would all look at a pile of aborted
fetuses and then sign a statement saying, "I'm positive
they aren't people. A woman has the right to kill it
two seconds before it leaves the womb, but not two
seconds afterward."
The phrase I hate is: abortion is a decision between a
women and her god. That's fine. Shiva does endorse
abortion. Look it up--Veda #378. But sometimes it's
"and her God." How can people say that?
I don't buy the attitude that says, "I don't think abortion is wrong, but there should be fewer abortions."
Isn't it ironic that some atheists would say people are
being close-minded if they say aliens don't exist? It
just goes to show that to many people the definition of "open-minded" is "open to what I believe"
There are folk in this country who will literally say,
"Without an education, you're nothing." Dick Cheney,
in fact, said in the vice presidential debate "We've
graduated 15 million kids from high school in the last
15 years who can't read at a basic level. They are
permanently sentenced to a lifetime of failure." And that's easy
and acceptable to say when the literacy rate is 99 percent. But
what about a country with a literacy rate of 50 percent? Are half of those citizens "nothing", "failures"? I think education is overrated, anyway. Woohoo, I got good grades, I know a lot of stuff.
One main reason I think the electoral college system
sucks is because, theoretically, one person in California could vote and that one vote would count as 10 percent of the country's votes.
What is marriage? Why do we have it? How did it
originate? The answers aren't as clear as we think
they are, it seems, but what is clear is that marriage
is intended for a man and a woman who love each other
so much that they want to be made one.
"Gay marriage"? Isn't that an oxymoron? From all we
know about marriage, it's clearly the unity of a man and
a woman.
And there's confusion about what marriage really is in
heterosexuals, too. Did the 50 percent of people who
get married and then get divorced really believe that
the union was God's plan for two spirits to become one?
What Judeo-Christians need to do is, in my opinion, take
back marriage from secular folk. This would basically mean
that clergy could refuse to marry two people if they
didn't understand what marriage really is. For any other
couple that is, or claims to be, in love, a judge could
pronounce them "domestic partners" or whatever they want
to be called. And they could have their precious tax
breaks and the other superficial perks that go with
marriage.
NASA is a waste of money. What are we looking for? A
race of creatures that knows the answer to life's
problems? Wouldn't it be funny if we found an alien and
asked it the secret to happiness, and he said "Love one
another." Maybe then people would see the waste that is
NASA...probably not.
I think teen pregnancy gets a bad rap. Who is anyone to say, "The age at which you want to have a child is the wrong age."? Obviously, some teen pregnancies are a bad idea, but so are some 20's pregnancies. Jesus resulted from a teen pregnancy and he turned out fine.
Maybe the fact that "we" (the racial majority) can't
find a lasting label for "them" (racial minorities)
should give us a clue that we shouldn't label people,
or at least that we don't have to. Why can't negroes,
blacks, or African-Americans; or Indians, American
Indians, or Native Americans just be humans? They can.
An article in the Columbus Dispatch recently told of Domino's Pizza founder Tom Monaghan's plans to build a 25-story crucifix in Ann Arbor Township, Michigan. Local resident Patricia Blom said, "It's outrageous! This will offend people in this multireligious area." First of all, I realize that people are easily offended these days, but if someone is offended by a symbol of a religion, that person needs serious help. Second, Patricia Blom, if the thing you find outrageous in this violent, hate-filled, morally-bereft world is a cross, (a la Jeff Foxworthy) you might be a pretend Christian.
"Please play the lottery responsibly" they say. I don't
buy it. I think playing the lottery at all (which is
to say throwing money away) is irresponsible. Maybe it
wouldn't be if every one in the world had enough to
eat, but they don't. It's sad that so many people want
to make some already well-off American schmoe a millionaire
when they can let someone who has nothing to
eat or nowhere to live had the basics of survival.
I don't care for the fact that one can put a red, white,
and blue ribbon logo on a basketball court and pretend that it has some deep significance. Why does a ribbon automatically mean something?
I am very happy I got out of school before the uniform
craze, because I would have freaked out on someone if I
couldn't wear whatever I wanted. I feel sorry for kids
who have to wear them, and I think people who make the
rules that require them should be ashamed. The main thing
they should have asked themselves is, "Would I have
wanted to someone to tell me what to wear when I was in
school?" The answer would be no, of course, but they
figured "Golden rule, schmolden rule." Because today,
there are gangs and such, that were invented circa 1980.
And the only way kids will respect others and be smarter
is to wear the same thing every other kid is wearing, every
day until the graduate. People who hold influence over
what kids can and can't do need to get their priorities
straight. Maybe they could share the gospel with them, if
they're concerned about the way they treat others, and
not stifle their creativity and independence.
I also don't care for the idea that kids can't wear
black or can't wear their pantlegs a certain way because
those are gang things. To me, the problem is the gang,
not the kid who may or may not be copying it, so to
punish someone for someone else's problem is wrong.
I don't think I buy the idea that someone can say, "I am grateful for all the men and women who have lost their lives so that we can be free" and "No son of mine is ever going into the Army." It seems to me you can't have it both ways. Either you believe that, as dc Talk sings, "We've got to be children of peace" or you believe that in order to have peace, you must prepare for war or not want peace at all.
At the risk of being a music Nazi, if one of my kids
brought an Eminem album into my house, yeah, it would
get burnt.
Vegetarianism is okay if you're doing it as a protest
against cruel practices toward animals. But...farmers
and slaughterhouses aren't shaking in their proverbial
boots over the lack of sales from one person...and,
many vegetarians are pro-abortion. So, it's like let's
save the animals, but not the people. Veganism,
though, I think is ridiculous through and through.
Yeah, we're so cruel to steal those eggs away from
chickens. Like they don't take stuff from us.
And I tell you what, if I ever became a vegetarian,
I wouldn't eat mock meat.
We live because other things die.
I don't mind people not using "B.C." and "A.D.", but
they should at least show some creativity. Changing
the terminology to "before common era" and "common era"
in the name of religious neutrality, but keeping the
same base year makes such people thieves, common thieves.
Come up some other fixed point in time to base your
calendar on.
Humanism is an interesting idea, but one gets the
feeling that all one needs to debunk it is the
newspaper or the evening news. Of course, humanism
maintains that humans can be ethical without a
supernatural power, not that they do. I guess a
humanist would have to say that humans fail miserably
with regard to their ability. At any rate, a theory
of mine is that in a way, humans underestimate
horribly their ability to do good things. AIDS,
poverty, warfare--these are things we can erradicate
in an instant, if we truly want to. It would involve
a lot of self-denial, of course. People would only be
able to have sex with one only person ever (or no one),
the rich would have to give willingly to the poor, and
we would all have to decide that we don't want to hurt
anyone else, respectively. It's just that simple.
Maybe instead of worrying so much about the overall
divorce rate in this country we should be concerned
mainly with divorces of Judeo-Christians. Because
frankly, as I understand it, non Judeo-Christians
weddings are nothing more than a way to get presents.
I could accept the idea that secular weddings are
about two people's commitment to each other except
that only about fifty percent of people seem to have
made anything more than a paper-thin commitment. Non
Judeo-Christians could raise the divorce rate extremely
high--just pick a random stranger every weekend and
take him or her to a judge to get hitched. Marry,
divorce, repeat as necessary. No, this is of little
concern (I write "little" instead of "no" because
innocent children are often hurt by secular divorces).
What would worry me is if fifty percent of the people
who actually made a serious, legimate commitment with
a member of the opposite sex and with God end up
divorced.
While I think racism is horrible and racial reconciliation is good, I don't like the idea of "reparations", that is, white people paying black people money because their ancestors owned slaves. The main reason is this: we have enough trouble in this day and age taking responsibility for own actions. Imagine if you had to be responsible for every action by every person in your family tree. That's too much of a burden to bear.
One thing the smarmy, pompous ACLU doesn't seem to
get is that many Americans don't want the Constitution
(no matter how it's interpreted) to be hovering above
them as a god of some sort, dictating every event in
their lives. Go ahead, ACLU, stop every attempt by
public school officials to acknowledge the fact that
Christians can't just put their faith on hold for six
hours a day, but don't expect to convince people that
this is what they must desire as "good Americans."
I say screw the Constitution if it is outdated (not
antiquated morality-wise, mind you) because we have
access to weapon like 18th-century people couldn't
imagine, or if its meaning becomes twisted so that
people can do just about anything they want in public
schools except live out their faith.
The following is the official position of the
Catholic church on abortion (I think), quoted in a non-Catholic-church
publication: "Our opposition
to abortion derives from the conviction that whatever
is opposed to life is a violation of man's [sic]
inherent rights..." My question is, what's the "[sic]"
for? The statement was written before the p.c. menace
descended upon man, but even if it wasn't: look up "man"in a current dictionary and find the definition, "the human race; mankind." You can use whatever words you want, for all I care, just don't interfere with others' right to use whatever words they want.
If I were shopping for a religion, I'd be very skeptical of any religion that didn't care whether or not I joined. Because if that's the case, isn't it just a club?
Rebellion is about more than just wearing baggy pants or
hating your parents or having a Darwin fish on your
car. Those things take no intelligence, guts, or creativity.
I don't respect any of those wussy attempts at rebellion, but I respect others. Jesus was, of course, the ultimate rebel. The rebellion I respect is about doing what's right when authorities do wrong, no matter what the cost.
Many people say they're proud to be white. I think that's ridiculous, partly because I don't buy the theory of a white race. Race can certainly be a touchy issue, but it's also a complex, ambiguous one: what is race, anyway; the color of your skin?, your culture?, the way you were made? Certainly the Bible describes creation, but it doesn't "explain" why people have different skin,
features, etc.
Here's an interesting listing from the dictionary:
Caucasoid adj. [from the erroneous notion that the orig. home of the hypothetical Indo-Europeans was the Caucasus] designating or of one of the major geographical varieties of human beings, including peoples of Europe, Africa, the Near East, India, etc., who are generally characterized by tall stature, straight or wavy hair, etc.: loosely
called the white race although it embraces many peoples
of dark skin color.
We never find it too difficult to withold aid to countries like Iraq or China or Cuba because they have nuclear weapons and only we are allowed to have them or because they have a different political system than us or whatever. But we would never dream of not kissing Israel's butt because they just can't lay off the killing their neighbors thing.
Greed is interesting in that people, Christian or not, almost never say, "I'm too greedy." There are many reasons that this sin is hard to detect in one's self. A major one is that someone always has more than you. That is, unless you're Bill Gates, and then you can always rationalize it with the "American dream" crap or the fact that you give a lot (.1 percent) to charity. (See Mark 12:41-44). And certainly it's hard for any American to see it, because we compare ourselves to our own country's rich citizens, not to "third-world" people. Sometimes I find myself buying something and being overcome with guilt, and I sarcastically think, "Well, there are people starving to death in Ethiopia, but I'll be darned if I'm gonna do without a memory card for my PlayStation." Maybe this is what we need to think more often. John the Baptist was clear: If you have more than enough of something, and your brother doesn't have enough, share. Just because our brothers are thousands of miles away doesn't mean we can neglect them.
Some people like to point out that Cal Ripken's consecutive-games-played streak gets too much attention, because it's no big deal just "going into work every day." But those people should ask themselves, "Have I had a sick day or a personal day in the last 13 years?" If the answer is yes, then you should probably quit criticizing him.
My feelings about head coverings worn my Muslim women: wear whatever you want, this is America. But as Michael W. Smith sings in Pursuit of the Dream, "It's not just what you do, but what you do it for." People don't wear the head covering strictly because they want to, but because they think that to do otherwise would be immodest. As far as I know, that's a question of morals, not preference. That is, their feeling is that any woman who doesn't cover her head is immodest. So my problem is that there are all these women running around with their hair exposed and Muslims don't care enough about them to tell them what's wrong.
In a rich, wasteful country, it's easy to point out things we spend money on that could be put to far better use by people who need it in life-or-death ways. But the one thing that stands out most to me
is vanity license plates. I find it hard to see one of those thing and not think, "Joe Famine-Stricken might be starving to death, but I'll be consarned if I don't let people know what my and my wife's initials are." (I recently saw a horribly wasteful one, "4 N MADE" on a BMW).
Every time I walked into the Capital University library,
there was a pile of Gay People's Chronicles on the newspaper table. The thing I don't get is that
these papers presumably only talk about gays in the
news and whatnot. Which I think is a little demeaning or maybe just stupid. I mean, would I every want to read a newspaper only about heterosexual white guys of German descent who like The Simpsons?
The other thing is, the "community" is now gay/lesbian/
bisexual/transsexual/transgender. At what point do all
these people not have anything in common?
I don't think it's right to label people "religious extremists" who are more accuratey "violence extremists" or "hatred extremists."
When I was a senior in high school, our government teacher asked our class who was in favor of the death penalty. All but two people said they were. Pathetic.
The word "atom" is from the Greek for indivisible. The discoverer of atoms wasn't stupid for giving them
that name; he just didn't realize that one day, people would be
able to split an atom. But it is stupid to call the United States
indivisible, because all one needs to do is look in a history book
and see that the U.S. was divided during the Civil War. That's
just one of several reasons why kids shouldn't be forced to
recite the pledge of allegiance.
The absence of pride is not necessarily shame.
The Ohio High School Athletic Association practices
gender discrimination. Period. But not necessarily
against girls as you may think, but against boys. At
Millersport High School, girls have the opportunity to
play volleyball, cross country, football, golf, basketball, softball, and track. Boys can play cross country, football, golf, basketball, baseball, and track. That's 7-6, and that's not fair. I contacted the OHSAA, and they said boys couldn't play on girls' teams, and they wouldn't admit that the reason is boys are better athletes and would dominate the sport if allowed to play.
Here's another bad thing about the OHSAA, and it's not their fault, because other people are certainly overcompetitive and unwilling to break with tradition. But would it be so awful if, in the middle of a 90-23 drubbing of Marysville, the ref said, "Okay, Latoya Turner, you switch to the Monarchs' side and Tigers, you take a Marysville player." It would benefit all, admit it.
One more thought about high school sports: It was awesome to go to such a small school that one could participate in sports regardless of talent. True, big schools offer a wider variety of sports, but not enough that everyone who wants to play gets to. So big schools should really work on having enough reserve teams or intramural teams that no one is left out. But also, as far as I'm concerned, why can't the people who do make a team be--instead of the most skilled--the people who want it most, the people who try hardest, the people who need to lose the most weight, the people who if they weren't playing sports would be doing drugs? Professional and maybe even college sports should be about who's the most athletic, but I don't think high school sports should. They really should be about staying in shape and having fun--those shouldn't just
be throw-away clichés.
What is with this Budweiser commercial where the dog clamps its teeth onto the beer bottle? Is this suppose to make me want to buy it? "Ooo, even dogs like beer, so I probably should like it too." Dog food commercials don't make me want to eat dog food.
After the murders at Columbine High School, many people put in their two cents about what to make of it all. Perhaps the most intelligent statement came from Misty Bernall, in her book, "She Said Yes":
It is also easier to get angry, to point fingers, or to lose oneself in what the media calls the "larger" issues. In the wake of Columbine that has meant gun control and video games, school security and Hollywood violence, preventative education and separation of church and state. All of these issues are important, but at the end of the day they may not be the things that really count...Why, when parents and lawmakers are calling for gun control and an end to TV violence, are our young crying out for relationships? Why, when we offer them psychologists and counselors and experts on conflict resolution, are they going to youth groups and looking for friends? Why, when everyone else is apportioning blame and constructing new defenses, are they talking about a change of the heart?
Punishing baseball players by fining them is like, well
it's like something. The point is, saying, "You did
something wrong, so you have to give up a tiny fraction of the one thing you can afford to give up" is hardly punishment.
I hate it when people try to defend ridiculous sports salaries by saying, "This is American; that's capitalism at work." The reason people say athletes shouldn't be paid millions of dollars isn't because those people are in favor of communism.
I don't think I believe anybody when they claim the reason they want to, say, pierce their uvula, is to express themself. How is that expressing anything, and what part of you is that expressing? Your love for punching holes in things? Your passion for infection? I wish people who do that crap would just be honest and say, "I have more money than I know what to do with" or "I hate authority figures so much that I want to get a negative reaction from them."
Timothy McVeigh is the kind of person many Americans love to hate--a hateful, anti-government, redneck psycho
who shows no remorse for killing dozens of people. And
yet, how do we treat him? Publish his book, put him in a cushy prison, give him lots of publicity, and give him
the easy way out by killing him. It seems to me that the better thing to do would be put him in a hole for the rest of his life and not print a word about or by him.
People who say, "If is elected, I'm going to leave the country" need to be flogged.
No offense to Jews, but where in the Bible does it say that Coke is unclean and needs to be made kosher?
I don't like the term "the American way." How can someone pretend that 285 million people have the same way of doing things, the same ideas and dreams and perspectives?
It's a lot easier to be of the opinion that people have a right to say whatever they want when people only say things that are not offensive to you or your friends or people you think should be immune to criticism.
One of the few things that ticks me off about "the
media" is when they try to protect us from reality.
There's no reason to have a picture of a stabbing
victim plastered on the front page of a paper, but why
not have the controversial photo of the charred Iraqi
soldier from the Gulf War? Yeah, we had good
intentions (oil) and limited "casualties," but plenty
of people died just the same, and is Kuwait better off
today? Maybe. That gruesome picture might have
convinced people that the war wasn't
just a big video game or the vehicle for a set of
popular trading cards.
All I ever needed to know I learned in kindergarten? Hardly.
Like what, how to finger paint? The Simpsons is the
greatest TV show ever. I'm not saying I've learned a ton
of life lessons from it, but it teaches one more stuff
than most people want to admit. From it, I've learned, among
hundreds of other things:
That the word "sinister" is Latin for left-handed
What Matthew 21:17 says
Who John Muir was
That Ganesha is a Hindu god
That Cheap Trick was a band
That Dos Equis is a Mexican beer
That Walt Whitman wrote "Leaves of Grass"
Who Ravi Shankar was
Who Flea is
Where Saint Ambrose was from
That Pixie Stix don't have any sugar
The second amendment, said Chief Justice Burger, "is the
subject of one of the greatest pieces of fraud, I
repeat the word fraud, on the American people by
special interest groups that I have seen in my
lifetime".
Some people have interpreted the part of the constitution that says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" as "No aspect of any religion shall be allowed into any public entity." That's a shame, if for no other reason than it's just more whining (we have plenty of that as it is). But what's equally troubling is the term they use to back up their claims: "separation of church and state." This term is of course not even found in the constitution, and it's not really an accurate representation of their ideas. It's not as if they really want "state" things over here and "church" things over there, never to touch each other for fear of contamination. They wouldn't complain about an American flag in a church, or their voting location being a church, or their tax dollars supporting Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, or the word "the" printed in a textbook used by a public school even thought that word appears many times in the Koran, etc. It's one's right to want a "separation of church and state." However, I think that the term "freedom from religion" would be more accurate. And as far as I can tell, "freedom from religion" is tantamount to biting the hand that feeds you, and I wouldn't recommend it.
I agree that some college nicknames can be offensive to Native Americans, like Redskins or Redmen or Fighting Sioux (that doesn't mean that if those colleges change their nickname they should choose a stupid replacement, like RedHawks or RedStorm, instead of, say, Sioux). However, I don't see how a name like "Aztecs" is offensive. Keep in mind that this doesn't even take into account the fact that maybe certain people are too hung up on what race they are (that is, I don't see anyone having a hissy because Notre Dame is called the Fighting Irish). Of course, I'm not a Native American and can't know what it's like to have a history of discrimination in my racial lineage. But, then again, if Podunk A&M was nicknamed the "Idiot Caucasians", I wouldn't give a crap.
One of my college roommates and I agreed that at Capital, the "Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Learning" was more like "Yea rah blackness day." I think it's silly to be proud of one's race or ethnicity, but there are certainly worse things to do. What's sad is that by making MLK Day into African-American Pride Day, they missed the whole point of Dr. King's message: that it doesn't matter what color one's skin is, that we should treat others with respect and compassion regardless of what they look like.
Jerry Seinfeld is not just funny, he also makes a lot of sense:
"...Take boxing, the simplest, stupidest sport of all. It's almost as if these two guys are just desperate to compete with each other, but they couldn't think of a sport. So they said, 'Why don't we just pound each other for forty-five minutes? Maybe someone will come watch that.' The real problem is that you have two guys fighting who have no prior argument. They should have the boxers come into the ring in little cars, drive around a little bit, eventually there's an accident. They get out...
'Didn't you see my signal?' 'Look at that fender!' 'Then you'd see a real fight.'
Do people want to protest the original Star-Spangled Banner
that's on display in the Smithsonian? No. But why not?
It's a symbol of racism. Slavery occurred while it represented
the U.S., just like the Confederate flag represented the
Confederacy when slavery occurred. I think the people who
can't admit the Civil War is over and they lost are wrong;
I also think the NAACP is wrong for "boycotting a state"--they're
depriving honest, hard-working, non-racist people of tourism
dollars because they think the flag only represents
slavery, and hence it must be the correct viewpoint.
Wow, that John Rocker fiasco was the ultimate feel-good
drama. Which is to say, people felt incredibly good
criticizing what they saw as bigotry. I may be joe schlub,
they thought, but at least I don't pass judgment on
people who have purple hair (or at least I don't say
so). I don't have anything against foreigners, they
puff themselves up by saying, and I wouldn't mind riding
on a train with them, if I for some reason left my cushy
suburb, filled with like-minded people. But aside from maybe
being hypocritical, the thing wrong with the witch hunt
was that Rocker was just saying what he felt. So he
doesn't want to be on a train by a queer with AIDS? What's
wrong with that? Is that offensive? No. If he would
have said, "I don't want to ride the seven with Scott
Pairan..." why should that offend me? And more importantly,
aren't we allowed to express our opinions in this country?
Why are people so quick to condemn John Rocker but unwilling to condemn the New Yorkers who threw batteries at him and spat at him, which started the whole thing?
What's with these PETA freaks who stand naked on a street corner holding a sign that says, "I'd rather go naked than wear fur." A)So don't wear fur...or are you saying that I shouldn't wear fur? Then just say that. And I'll say, "Bite me. Do you want me telling you that you shouldn't have an abortion?" B)There are other options besides wearing fur and being naked.
It would take a lot of guts, but I would love to see a school
turn down the money it would normally get from the
lottery. I think it blows that people who would vote against
school levies would try to rationalize the lottery by saying
that it helps schools.
Candy is dandy, but liquor blows
Anyone who says "Jesus was a good man" is probably either stupid, a liar, or trying to appease Christians for some reason. There are plenty of things he said to back this up, but the best is, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone."
Here's an essential difference between high school and
college for me:
high school: Pete Gruhlke stepping on Mark Keene's shoe
and Mark yelling "Dude, screw!"
college: Bill Gibbons smashing his keyboard with his
fist and yelling "Nutbag!"
I make college out like it was horrible. I had some
great times at Cap, but I never find myself wishing I
were back there. Not so about high school, however. And
the thing that makes me long to be back there again more
than anything else is the feeling of an autumn evening.
You almost can't describe it, you just have to experience
it, but it's this coolness to the air... Friday nights
grades 8-12 were incredible. It was great because you
knew the football team was gonna go down like the Kursk,
but it didn't matter in the slightest. You were
doing something you were good at, with a group of people
who were in it with you. And that's a situation I don't find myself in anymore.
It's okay to sell lethal, addictive cigarettes, but not lethal, addictive cocaine.
It's okay to throw cigarette butts on the ground, but not to tp someone's house.
It's okay to pummel someone in the face, but not to bite off his ear.
It's okay to be proud that you're Negro, but not to be proud that you're Caucasian.
It's okay to kill a baby just about to leave the womb, but not to kill a baby seconds after she left the womb.
It's okay to carry a gun around if you're law-abiding, but not to carry a gun around if you've ever broken any law.
It's okay to scream at student athletes, but not to pray with them.
It's okay to encourage gambling to create jobs, but not okay to encourage prostitution to create jobs.
It's okay to say that all men are scum, but not that all Germans are evil.
It's okay to make fun of John Ashcroft for saying a bare breast is immodest, but not to make fun of someone who says it's immodest for a woman to not cover her head.
Things I would love to see happen:
Budweiser goes bankrupt
Cuba stops being a butthead
A talented high school sports team foregoes success to let everyone play
That Einstein Pepsi commercial goes off the air
A presidential candidate swears in a commercial if he/
she is going to at other times
A convenience store clerk tells me, "Thank you, come
again" ala Apu
A presidential campaign where I want to vote for one of
the candidates
Things I hope I never do:
Use emoticons
Drink beer
Grow burnsides
Give money to a political organization
Be overly concerned about my child's sporting event
Spend thousands of dollars on my wedding
Get caller i.d.
Listen to a band named Hole, Garbage, Tool or such
Get a vanity license plate
Things we've done wrong as a nation:
Determined that there's something wrong with being a housewife/househusband
Become the world's military watchdog
Misinterpreted the establishment clause of the first amendment
Made sports more important than they should be
Decided that if someone has a belief then it must be a legitimate belief
Decided that the way to give kids a better chance at a good life is to spoil them
Become too urban
Things I'd try to do if I were president:
Change our paper money to plastic
Make Election Day a holiday, in place of Columbus Day
Change the ridiculous law that says a 20-year-old can't ring up alcohol at a store
Give the District of Columbia voting representation in congress
Outlaw boxing
Change the law requiring the president to be born in America
