Warts, Scars and McNasty

At one time, many years ago, some travel magazines labeled this writer as the world's most traveled man, certainly the most traveled blind man. My passport has been stamped in 157 countries, in 8 around-the-world trips, such a variety as London and Hong Kong by train...crossing Russia and the Gobi. It was not easy, but younger, I had the energy and ambition to do it. I truly believe God wanted me to experience the smells and sounds of the world, every continent, so I could more easily accept my total blindness, which I have offered to him as my sacrifice.

I carried with me five cameras, many rolls of film. Back then, the digital camera was a part of someone's future imagination. I spent much money on pictures, slides, memories which I thought, at the time, would be of value to someone. I found, as this should be no surprise to anyone, that most people do not care about the pictures of the world, my accounts of conditions of the world, or about anything else that does not pertain to them. As one of my friends, a friend of an astronaut said, “most people are interested in themselves...as the world closes in on them.” They can get all they want from their 'idol' which they worship in their living room, the best pictures and sounds on television...even church services. I had thought the population of this country would be interested in my accounts of the geopolitical activities of communist countries, and communist people.

Several trips through Russia, China, Burma, several African police state nations, I can tell you, without fear of contradiction, America is rapidly becoming a totalitarian, collectivist, socialist society. From the media, from academia, from industry, America is projecting the theme of the communist John Dewey, the “end justifies the means.” Burma, now called the Union of Myanmar, is perhaps the most classic totalitarian country. I have never been to Cuba, which I understand is a classic communist text.

Arriving in Rangoon, the airport, I could not understand the smell, awful beyond anything one can imagine. As a young doctor, coming into contact with patients, my most difficult adjustment was human odor. I understand the decaying animal body is the worse odor in the world, but, in the airport in Rangoon, Burma, there was an odor which would cause the strongest, most stable individual to get weak. It came from the public latrines, most communist countries will not spend the necessary funds for disinfectants and cleaning. I took the train from Rangoon to Mandalay, and the train stations had the same odor. I noticed this odor in every communist nation, every police state, after so much government bureaucracy and degradation, after so much government corruption and collapse, the people simply do not care. They have lost their humanity, their ideas of self-worth, decency, most are just in the attitude/mode of survival.

This morning, again, the subject of our conversation at the breakfast table at McDonalds was “decency”. There is a group of older men who eat together at a local McDonalds in the morning, I usually join them, along with my driver, about two mornings to the week. About one week ago, the men's bathroom in this McDonalds clogged up, I understand the smell and the inconvenience is atrocious. The problem discussed was that all had called the local health department, and nothing had been done. Since I am a cleanliness radical, if my driver tells me about unsanitary conditions anywhere, I usually call the health department. There is nothing more deadly than filth, whether at a Katrina disaster, whether with millions of eggs, whether with infections in a hospital or nursing home, or in a public restaurant serving food to the public.

Of course, as I have written many times, even in a time of depression, when jobs are scarce, when incompetence could be easily replaced, most employees of government agencies, in particular, are just “going through the motions.” They have all learned to answer the phone politely, put you on hold as despicable music or advertisements insult you, and then take your name and number, because usually those who could actually do something about a problem are never available.

Even if you personally know responsible individuals (bureaucrats or elected politicians), they have been instructed to always leave the epic retort, “he is in a meeting”, or the more delicate word, “conference”. I have told many of my friends who own companies, or who are in responsible positions in companies, “try calling your office, disguise your voice, don't let them know who you are, and learn the truth about how your clients are treated.” It is bad enough in the private sector, but an impossible situation in the public sector. As in every communist society, with controls and lack of concern, they just don't care.

Even if you write a congressman or senator, each has fifty assistants, the elected one will never see the letter. They have prearranged and approved generic letters to go out about everything, the computer just coughs one out. Letters I receive from elected officials, even to a totally blind, 100% disabled, service-connected veteran who has given his eyes to their country, are not treated any better than a prisoner in the local jail. More money is spent on the prisoner than on the veteran, the prisoner's vote counts just as much as the veteran's. The politician just wants the veteran, the common citizen to just keep working and paying taxes, “don't bother me with anything.” And so it is with the public health service, when enough people die from something, they might get interested, might have a recall, might actually investigate or hand out a citation.

Years ago, the restaurant chain Hardees headquarters was in Rocky Mount, NC. The C.E.O. Leonard Rawles owned a home on the local beach, near my beach home. I was a large Hardees stockholder, on the beach one day, I said to him, “if the big wheels at your headquarters would get off their big behinds and go to the franchises, unannounced, acting as a regular customer, and observe what goes on there, your bottom line would improve tremendously.” My gripe with the military, I was a field grade officer, inspecting and being inspected, inspection notices were always sent ahead of time, the military spends much time with “eyewash” and other things preparing for an inspection, much as a lawyer prepares for a case in court. The only effective inspections are done on the spot, without notice, a surprise to everyone.

My life has been one long monsoon, I hear people talk about the problems of recession. I was born during the Great Depression, and I have never known anything else, never known what it is to be unconcerned about things, not conservative about everything. It must be nice to be a liberal, “eat, drink, and be merry”, “spend and spree”, “don't worry about tomorrow”, “worriers die young”.

You become a cynic, cynical about politics, hypocrisy in church and state. My main sinful problem is that I am too serious, stay too busy, I have never had a boring moment in my life. I get short with people who take up my valuable time, in person and particularly on the telephone. I am very rude to telemarketers, my shortness with people is not Christian, these callers are just trying to make a living, they do not know that I am busy.

With total blindness, everything is difficult. A few days ago, I was trying to get in my backdoor, trying to save every second of time, I try to have my door key out before I get out of the car. A wood frame had fallen over and partially blocked the door, I was trying to squeeze through the opening when my cell phone rang in my pocket. I tried to answer my phone halfway through the opening, it was a sales pitch. I said, “get off my phone, don't ever call me again.” Does this sound Christian, does this sound American? Are we all caught up in the warts and scars brought on by the socioeconomic strife of living in a hectic society which is crushing us. Perhaps this the reason that public health officials do not act when the public's health is involved. Perhaps this is the reason no one holds anyone responsible. With government as with commerce, only interested in the bottom line, regardless of warts and scars.

Abandoned Graveyard (2009)

Robert Frost, receiver of 4 Pulitzer prizes, who died in 1963 shortly after he gave a poem at the Kennedy inauguration, is one of our country's greatest poets.

In a Disused Graveyard

The living come with grassy tread
To read the gravestones on the hill;
The graveyard draws the living still,
But never anymore the dead.
The verses in it say and say:
"The ones who living come today
To read the stones and go away
Tomorrow dead will come to stay."
So sure of death the marbles rhyme,
Yet can't help marking all the time
How no one dead will seem to come.
What is it men are shrinking from?
It would be easy to be clever
And tell the stones: Men hate to die
And have stopped dying now forever.
I think they would believe the lie.

Robert Lee Frost

Some years ago, my cousin, a few years older then me, called me about a “find” on land which had been in the family for a very long time. He said, “you remember the small, old cemetery in a field owned by one of our uncles completely “grown up” with bushes which we always referred to as an old cemetery full of snakes.” He continued, “ I don’t think anyone had been in the place for 50 years or more. I decided to take some of my “help” there with some bush axes and clean the place up.  I was amazed to find the graves and the tombstones of 2 of our relatives who had died in the civil war.  Do you know anything about them?” 

Knowing that I was the one cousin, the one member of the family, who had shown interest in history and genealogy, he had even called me about the age of many relics at the old family church built by our great grandparents.  He said, “Their names were Nathan and Cyrus.”  It was a matter of history records in the courthouse that these two along with some other family members had participated in the Civil War. The courthouse records did not indicate their survival. Some of the early family in particular a physician and nurse who were brother and sister to my grandfather, had moved back up north to Morristown NJ from where the family had originally come to NC. It was believed that these 2 uncles had gone back there after the Civil War.  The significance and the tragedy is, that the great uncles had been brought home for burial and were evidently buried in this place along with several other family members who perhaps died in the great flu epidemic.  Old family members now are buried in a cemetery near the road and near the old family homes of both my mother and father. 

In recent years, of course, with all the younger members of these families, better educated and looking for better opportunities no longer live in the area.  The cousin who called me, is the only family member in the old family church, built in 1874.  Most of the other relatives are long gone, dead or moved away totally.  And, in the modern years of perpetual care cemeteries, the fact that family members have become people of wealth, their fathers and mothers have been buried in city cemeteries where “cleaning and maintenance” of cemetery property is not their responsibility.

There was a time, in the country, when families would gather at a cemetery usually a time in connection with “homecoming” at the church, when they would clean and maintain the cemetery. The only time most descendants go to an old family cemetery anymore is in the case of a “pang” of genealogy curiosity when they want to get some dates off a tombstone. The conscience “heart trouble” which bothered me and I suppose my cousin, was the fact that, like most veterans, who have had the “guts” to defend their country and the “pride” to march into battle “thinking” their family and their country would appreciate their belief and faithfulness in what they were doing was short lived.

It would be interesting to know how their bodies were returned to the “dirt” which they had plowed as young men for internment by their own families, not a grave digging platoon of the army on some foreign battle ground. Since the family church had not been built at the time, it was built immediately after the war, I’m sure services were held at their old family homes, which is about deteriorated and I am sure that family members shed tears before they were buried in probably a family constructed box. ( Before the time of funeral homes and manufactured caskets saw mills would saw a timber wide enough, which after drying out could be used for the construction of a burial box. Such wood was a mainstay at every farm home. The sanitizing of death was unknown to the early pioneers. Today’s death, is a sanitized impersonal semi- ritual, some of the caskets even have inner spring mattresses.  The satin which lines today’s fancy burial casket was not available even for the kings of yesteryear and embalming is a new science, since the body starts deteriorating one-half minute after death. (The “keeping out” of a body because of the “purging” sequence was the most unkind thing that could happen to a family.)

It could be that since my great-great grandfather was a large landowner he had the influence of being able to have his sons transported home for burial.  In any case, it is a shame that their graves were forgotten, that the small area that the graves were located, as is always the case, just became a wilderness of trees and bushes, continuously plowed around by the tenants who farmed the land.

My father, a descendant of these veterans, was a superior farmer in every respect as was his father etc. In ‘housing” the crops each year, the seed from superior plants were always saved for seed. It is a fact of human nature animal husbandry and agriculture, that you use the best for reproduction. It is sad that we have forgotten this fact in human reproduction.  My father selected the most beautiful pigs for his brood sows, the most beautiful calves for his milk cows, the most beautiful ears of corn for his seed corn.

For most of my life, I carried in my pocket a seed of corn which, every time I felt of it, I knew that I was the best and that the best was expected of me.  The alcoholic carries in his pocket a small Christian cross when he is tempted to take an alcoholic drink he puts his hand in his pocket and feels of the cross, knowing that better is expected of him.  One of my less educated employees (and I have had my share of those that do not know anything about anything, certainly would think a kernel of corn should be thrown away) disposed of this kernel of corn some years ago.  But I carry the thought in my “very being” everyday of my life that the very “holy spirit of God” in dwells me and I have never forgotten the price paid for me.

So, it bothers me that my descendants did not remember and did not hold in high esteem their ancestors who went to war to fight for their belief whether it was right or wrong.  The black people who worked on my descendants farms did not leave after the emancipation. It was God’s business about the different colors of skins of the different people of the world. According to historical records, my family never “owned” other people, they all worked together, until the last old house occupied by black slave descendants were destroyed by a storm some years ago. One house on my grandfather’s farm was called “Elisha's house”.  A black man who had stayed on until his death like his folks before him, sharing in the work and in the meager profits of the farm. 

Who knows what these two fallen, civil war soldiers would have done with their lives. Like and uncles and aunts, they may have returned to the place of landing in New Jersey, they may have contributed to life in Eastern NC. Anyway, from an abandoned graveyard, and there are many others throughout the world we find the final resting place for those who served. Service is humanity is the greatest work of life (Jaycee creed)

A Great Story (2009)

When my father was a young person, he knew a young man in the community who cared nothing about the church, or the school, or his family, or his neighbors, or anything else except himself. His selfishness got him into some real trouble and so he left the state and went down to Texas and became an oil field worker, really became a wildcatter (a person who drills oil wells in areas that are not in advance known to be oil fields), and by the time I was a child he had returned to the community for visits showing off his millionaire success riding in a large stretch limousine with a wife of questionable advantages.

I say this because one morning in the Quaker church, of all places, where as a child, I was with my parent who were visiting there, where Quaker women are conservative in every way. She evidently thought she was in a night club and pulled out her compact and lipstick and did her face while the sermon was going on. Anyway, he shared his wealth with his long estranged family by first going to the family cemetery and replacing all the tombstones with far more expensive ones, putting a nice fence around the cemetery, and building a roadway from the highway to the cemetery, buying all the land around the cemetery and much other land in the community, remodeling his relatives homes, and generally, “spreading his wealth” (a familiar term). Mr. Mitchell is long dead, but the stories of his largess to the church which he never attended in his youth, and to the relatives whom he hardly knew, persist.

Perhaps the greatest story in all of literature, is the so called “Prodigal Son.” It is a story of a young Jewish boy with a remarkable father and less remarkable older brother, who took an early inheritance and went far from home, probably Babylon-Vegas. Where he wasted his inheritance and when this Jewish boy had to resort to feeding pigs the scriptures says, “he came to himself” (Luke 15:17). How many days did his loving father stand looking in the distance thinking about his lost son. The scripture says he recognized him, probably by his walk or something and he ran to meet him. The remarkable part of this story is that the older brother resented the festivities of the homecoming. But, the remarkable father said to the resentful brother, entreated him and assured him that his remaining property was his.

I have sympathy for both the son who wanted to get away from home (because I had a real strict father) and I have sympathy for the older brother who had stayed at home, worked hard, and did not have as much empathy for his younger brother. Our Lord gives us these parables such as the man who went and hired people to work in his vineyard and paid the ones who came to work first the same as the ones who came to work last. This helps us to better understand death bed conversions or even the repentant thief on the cross.

It helps me as a blind Christian (I am a totally blind 100% disabled service connected veteran) to show some benevolence toward healthy, wealthy men in this very community who went to Canada to escape military service ,but returned to become the leading politicians and some of the wealthiest party givers and party goers at the country clubs of the community. They are the “good time, good ole boys” of the community and they and their wives look down their noses, particularly at church, at those of us who were foolish enough to live committed lives directed by the holy will of God.

We can be sure that God will discipline his own. These good ole boys already belong to Satan and they will have their enjoyment, “here and now.” “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 1:7)

We who live in the darkness of blindness, who have given our best to our country, have values some will never understand outside of a spiritual conversion. 

Character determines destination, Our values are set by home and school. We cannot prevent birds flying over our heads, but we can prevent them from building nests in our hair. It is the anti-Christian home and the anti-Christian school system, that permits the building of the nest of socialism, admiration for political corruption, and disdain for nobility of human life that has brought down individuals and governments. Right now, the worlds largest democracy, Indonesia, a country of 5,000 islands, is making the decision of either continuing as a democracy or becoming the world's largest Muslim theocracy. We pray that the secular movement in this country that has permeated the home, government, school systems, universities, media, and even the largest corporations will not be over taken by this cancer.

The story of America, the success of America is based on free enterprise, capitalism, and constitutional rights that include everyone, even the minorities. A democratic republic established by a magnificent constitution, gives to every citizen the freedom to fail or to succeed. Bill Gates, a man of wealth and intelligence, in his rules for success in business, states in the first rule, there is no such thing as fairness. We are just given opportunity along with responsibility, whether at home, or wildcatting in a foreign place.

Abraham Lincoln, said he was not afraid of this country being conquered by another country. His fear was that it might implode from the corruption and the anti-American curse from within. 125,000 men who lie buried in foreign cemeteries attest to the fact that this country is worth defending. It is the greatest story of a successful nation in history. And the story is resplendent with men and women of faith who are responsible for the success. They had faith in the promise of America and faith in the decency of one another.

Bridges

In my office, I have the famous Newhouse picture of The Golden Gate Bridge over San Francisco Bay. Construction started in 1933 and finished in 1937 during the worst years of The Great Depression. 80,000 miles of cable went into the construction of this great bridge, enough cable to go around the world six times. The cost, even then, was $35 million.

One of the exciting experiences in China was crossing the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge China with an artery for cars upper and trains lower, spanning over the Yangtze River 160 meters. It was completed in 1968 and is the first double-decker, double-track highway and railway bridge designed and constructed by the Chinese without outside engineering assistance.

These bridges like bridges all over the world are the most important commercial structures for mankind. Most of the world’s great cities are built on river waterways or harbors. Until 1900, there were very few bridges of any length. Engineering and expense were too prohibitive. As in Indonesia, a country of islands (5,000), the Harbor at Hong Kong or even some US cities, ferries are used to move people and industry from one side to the other.

Great bridges like other great miracles of industry first become a vision on paper but as with the runner in race competition it takes someone with the “heart” to do it. Two men can look through prison bars, one sees the sky and the stars beyond, the other sees muddy ground. It is first in the mind the construction of a bridge or the desire to heal the sick. God gives remarkable ability and courage, sometimes unexpectedly, to one with the desire or the vision. We can do great things when we get that “inner strength” for accomplishment.

My Mother never tired of telling the story of a neighbor whose house was on fire. She had been a semi-invalid for years but she came running out of her house carrying her sewing machine. From somewhere, somehow, science cannot explain these things. She got the inner strength to overcome her crippled body and not only save herself but her most precious possession, her sewing machine, at the right time. At the right time, an engineer was given the inner strength and knowledge to plan the construction of the bridge in San Francisco, the bridge in Nanjing, the Brooklyn Bridge in New York and many of the other great bridges or other marvels of human engineering around the world.

There were two thieves on either side of our Blessed Lord on Calvary suffering the same crucifixion as Jesus. Both heard him say, “Father forgive them,” but only one asked to be forgiven, and he was told he would be the second person in Heaven, “Paradise.”  The great man-made and constructed bridges cannot be lessened in their importance but the greatest bridge ever built was the simple cross, first carried by a slave from Africa, Simon of Cyrene, which connects mortals from earth to immortals in Paradise.

Rabbi Harold Cushing, in his book Why Bad Things Happen To Good People states that it is only through pain, suffering, disability that many of us fully understand the plan of redemption.

Construction on the 6,000 foot Brooklyn Bridge began in 1870. The designers directing the construction of the bridge were Emily Roebling, John Roebling and Washington Roebling. The Brooklyn Bridge might not have been built had it not been for Emily Warren Roebling. Most history books cite her father-in-law John Roebling and her husband Washington Roebling as the bridge’s builders. Early into construction in 1872, however, collapsing bridge timbers crushed John Roebling’s legs, leaving him incapacitated. Soon after, an illness paralyzed Washington Roebling.

With both men out of commission, Emily Warren Roebling took over. Under her husband’s guidance, Emily had studied higher mathematics, the calculations of catenary curves, the strengths of materials, bridge specifications, and the intricacies of cable construction. She spent the next 11 years supervising the bridge’s construction. Living close by, they directed the construction of the bridge from the window of their house. The Brooklyn Bridge was completed thirteen years later and was opened for use on May 24, 1883.

The miracle of “mind over matter” is the same blessing the Ancients knew, our ancestors witnessed and those of us who are disabled and know people who are disabled, it is the human spirit, that inner strength, the “heart” of accomplishment, that causes the runner to win the race, the surviving spirit in every tragedy. How many times, in earthquakes, after thousands of dead and wounded have been removed, and someone says it is now a matter of locating the dead. When the dogs are brought in to sniff out the dead, we find survivors, people who by some inner strength have held on to life.

We know the value of life and the certainty of the bridge that goes both ways when we encounter these miracles. (I know the miracle, I am totally blind 100% disabled service connected veteran). With time, everyone will encounter the need for inner strength.  Hold onto your friends and above all hold on to your greatest friend the One who will give you the inner strength and the One who will never leave you alone.

A Spending Diary

Since childhood, this writer has been ridiculed because of his frugal habits of saving money. Don’t we wish that we had sent some politicians and bureaucrats to Washington and other places where power brokers gather who know more about saving than spending. Dr. Franklin said “If you would be wealthy, think of saving as well as getting.” (Benjamin Franklin born in 1706 and died in 1790). Saving money is a state of mind. When one discovers, and it is something you learn early, if you are wise, you cannot invest what you have spent, and it takes money to make money. We have “supposed leaders” in our nation today who can be well described as “big spenders.” They love to spend other people's money, tax money, even though, they with all their political knowledge do not themselves pay taxes (Daschle, Rangel).  I have found, in meeting politicians locally, state wide, and nationally, that most have never worked a day in their lives and that they know nothing about the saving of money. Most come from homes of privilege. The new politicians are products of education grants and the largess of hard-working taxpayers.

Because of their connections, family political contributions, good looks, glib tongues, often lack of character, and many other things that put low men in high places. Our county, state, and federal governments are on the road to disaster.

Early in life, and I have explained on the platform and in writing, I started keeping a spending diary.  If you go to my bedroom right now, you will find a notebook where each day by the date of that day, I list every penny I have spent that day and for what, and if I went to a restaurant the tip is included also. When, at the end of the week or month, you add how much you have spent you will have the discipline to keep from spending.  The credit card should only be used in an emergency or used to verify a purchase in case of a return or misrepresentation. The credit card has been a financial disaster to most citizens much to the joy of the corrupt banking system, who make more money on fees and penalties then anywhere else.

You cannot out give God. It is essential that you recognize early in life that the greatest way you can show your worship is by giving God not just 10% but in my case 50%. As was the case with Elijah and the widow.  “And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the LORD, which he spake by Elijah.” (1 Kings 17:16)  To this moment, every promise and every prophecy of God's word has been fulfilled.  If you want to live along live, (honor your parents, exodus 20).  If God desires you to have wealth, it is His business, GOD IS BOSS. But, it is up to you to not be slothful, to work hard, invest well, prepare for future needs, and learn early in life, as I heard my thrifty mother say so many times, “money does not grow on trees.”

Because of politicians and bureaucrats spending your money which you paid in taxation, it takes every dollar paid in tax just to finance social security, medicare and medicaid. All other expenses of federal government: wars, research, grants...all this money is borrowed...mostly from the country of China. Since President Obama has been in office, the national debt has increased 4.4 trillion dollars, this is more debt than was borrowed from George Washington, first President, until George W. Bush, 43rd President. The national debit is now $14 trillion dollars, this is 14 with twelve zeros. Every American, man woman and child is in debt to the government $45,000. There is no way this debt can be paid, it is predicted that this FICA tax, now 15% of your paycheck will double to the 30% of your paycheck. It is predicted that all retirement funds, entitlements, will be eaten away by the debt. Mark Twain said, “the scripture I cannot understand does not bother me, it is the scripture that I do understand that bothers me.” Gods word tell us to stay out of debt, individually and as a nation.

I Know Nothing (2009)

Hogan’s Heroes was a television situation comedy running from 1965 to 1971 with 168 episodes. The comedy featured a prisoner of war camp in Germany where American prisoners were adept at managing their own prison camp letting the camp commander, Colonel Klink, think he was in charge. Sergeant Schultz, the jovial, somewhat retarded sergeant in charge who had a line which has been used by Americans of this television generation for nearly 40 years, “I know nothing.” Any time you hear this line, you are talking with a person of that generation and everyone immediately takes reference.

The great comedian, Will Rogers, was quoted as saying, “All I know is what I read in the newspapers.” Since I dictate these articles, “all I know” is what I remember from a very different world, 50 years ago, when I had eyesight, could read, observe and keep up with things. I lost my eyesight as an Army medical officer during the Korean War era. When I could last see, women looked like women, effeminate, manicured, well groomed.  They wore dresses, heels, jewelry, perfume. I understand that men now have taken on these traits. I understand that men now wear earrings, have long hair, are shaped more like women than men. Most men have always been attracted to femininity. Women have always been attracted to masculinity.

I saw this coming in the military, 50 years ago.  I was on the staff of the Army Hospital at Fort McClellan, Alabama, The Women’s Army Corp (WACS) Training Center.  It bothered me to see these masculine-type women come in for treatment wearing male clothes even to brogans (laced-up boots). In their effort to be masculine, they forgot personal hygiene.

In recent years, since there is an integration of women with men in all military units, people I still know in the military tell me that the worst thing that could possibly have happened to this military super power is the influx of women who want to be treated like men, but in God’s sexual economy, cannot meet the requirements of the men. I understand that if a woman is pregnant, she stays on light duty and that in many cases, like the Canadian Eskimos (I learned all about the Canadian Eskimos when traveling through the Canadian Western Provinces.) They are treated like eunuch pets. Gloria Steinem said, on one of her better days, “Women need a man like ‘a fish needs a bicycle.’”

The most pitiful young man I have ever known worked for me in one business I owned for several months. His lesbian mother lived with her lesbian female friend and they had raised this young man. He needed a man to talk with desperately and talk he did. He described the perverted torture in coming of age (with all the chaos of sexual identity in youth) in such a debilitating environment.

Another young man who also was an employee told me at length about his masochistic “wannabe man” mother. One girl, who worked for me told me how, in coming home from school to her house, her mother would come to the door and tell her to go to a neighbor’s house because her mother was “entertaining.” She did not want to go to the neighbor’s nor did the neighbor want her there. She said, “I want nothing to do with my biological mother,” and so was the same expression from all of those I have known. In the several gay men I have known, not one has ever referred to his father. Do the biological parents living together or single (37% of all mothers are single) understand the psychosis of sexual identity? Since I had considerable eyesight problems while still on active duty, I was used as a psychiatrist in listening and, I hope, helping young women trying to escape the memories of their childhood abuse. Only a priest, could show upmanship on me as to what he has heard.

The greatest evil in the world is the evil of abortion, the taking of the most innocent of human life. Next to that, is the evil sexual promiscuity with same sex couples trying to rear an innocent child who probably has sane, unperverted sexual desires and, sane aspirations for life.

I asked a Catholic priest recently about so many priests leaving the priesthood, Catholics voting for abortion, effects of pedophilia in the ranks. He said, “Thank God it is such a small percentage but ’you just get used to it.’” My mind was not wired, I cannot get my mind around the morality of compromise with actions which I know to be wrong. When I was in school, we, as future doctors, were embarrassed to talk of abortion. Doctors who did abortions were the dregs of society. My Christian convictions limit my even considering acceptance of homosexuality and same-sex marriage. It is beyond comprehension that anyone who has ever read, perused God’s word, particularly a minister who attended a Bible college or seminary, who knows anything at all about the Church being the Bride of Christ, the biblical requirements of a bishop as found in Paul’s Letter To Timothy, the historical scholarship of all religions including natural law, could refute this or natural law.

Even in tribes, untouched by civilization and Christianity, a man has one wife and they have children. They have things and other people do not steal their things. Some laws written and unwritten make sense. The Bible is a law book. The Children of Israel lived under 613 laws, the greatest, the Ten Commandments. Christ came to fulfill these laws with just two commandments, Love For God and Love For Neighbor.

In the agnostic, world of atheism, world in which your children will be indoctrinated, Satan wants them to have academic freedom and freedom of inquiry. This is the mantra of Father Jenkins, President of Notre Dame, in inviting against the wishes of the people and the bishops, Obama to speak at the May 19 Commencement. Why should a Christian school, as a matter of prestige or show of academic freedom, invite a non-believing, anti-life speaker, President or not? IF CHRISTIANS WERE WILLING TO LIVE THEIR FAITH BEFORE THE WORLD, THE WORLD WOULD ALREADY HAVE BEEN CONVERTED TO CHRIST. Instead of the Church changing the world, the world has changed the Church.  Mahatmas Gandhi, who could have led millions of Hindus to a knowledge of Christ, said, “I would have been a Christian if I had not known so many Christians.”

Mark Twain said India is the ultimate travel destination. I have traveled India many times. In Goa, I met the most fascinating man on earth. He was a Tibetan refugee, a warm, sensitive Buddhist. But, he knew more about Christianity than most Christian theologians. He had memorized much of the New Testament.  Like a Jewish scholar had told me earlier in my life, “There is nothing more beautiful than the love of God portrayed in the Gospels and the Epistles.” “God’s word is forever settled in heaven.” (Psalm 119:89) . Hear it, read it, study it, memorize and meditate, get it in your mind.

Empowerment

A subject of research is the migration of the Monarch Butterfly that navigates winter in northern areas including Canada and flies south to Michoacán, Mexico. A great mystery, like the Northwest Salmon that migrate, or the Arctic Tern which migrates 3,000 miles each season from the Arctic to the Antarctic, I was amazed on visiting the cliffs around the Arctic Ocean to see the areas almost totally covered by these birds where they are hatched. It further amazes me that this small bird about the size of your fist has the innate ability, or empowerment, to leave the Arctic and fly 3,000 miles to their summer “camp ground.” The butterfly, the salmon, the tern, all empowered by an all-sufficient Creator to find their route of travel and their maintenance by the will of God. Over and over, we are told to watch the ants, the way this smallest of visible creatures can maintain and, if this isn’t sufficient, get a microscope and watch life without backbones as they live and multiply.

When the British archeologist Carter first opened the Tut Tomb in the Valley of The Kings in Egypt (this is one of the few tombs which had not been robbed earlier), among the magnificence of gold and treasure, was the unwanted capture of microbiology, still thriving after thousands of years, diseases unknown to science at that time and even today, which sickened and killed much of the healthy. Carter survived, but was never well after this.


The greatest challenge in today’s world of technology is laziness. Never in history have we had the ability to empower civilization with the knowledge and morality that we have today. Yet, young people whose ancestors developed power instruments and appliances, discoveries for better health, expeditions into outer space, drop out of high school without knowing how to do anything and even most with diplomas, cannot read or write. 40% of live births in this day of reproductive education, are to single mothers. 50% of the population in this day of nutritional knowledge, are diabetic. 68% of the population in this day of multiple exercise facilities and carefully controlled foods, are overweight. Nearly 75% of the population are addicted to some substance that is dangerous. Only 8% of the world’s population are living with any semblance of prosperity. (If you have a car and some money in the bank, you are better off than 92% of the world’s population.)

From 1799 to 1892, this nation was dedicated by the U.S. Supreme Court to be Christian. At the rate of nearly 10% each year, we are becoming less a Christian nation. Occasionally, you will have someone in industry or athletics as the exception. The owner of Chic-Filet has always closed his business on the Lord’s Day. Mormon athletes will not participate in athletic events on the Lord’s Day. Sandy Koufax, famous Jewish baseball pitcher, would not play ball on Saturday, the Jewish Lord's Day.


In a country blessed of God with the entanglements of materialism, 30,000 citizens, mostly young people, commit suicide every year, one every 3 minutes. Young girls, having given their most private and precious possession to someone seeking sexual gratification, do not feel empowered to give live birth to the life within them, the greatest of God‘s creation, and so, enabled by godless Planned Parenthood, godless social workers and councilors, 63 million babies are slaughtered in the holocaust abortion mills, particularly among the Black population. The black population numbers 13% of the total American population yet accounts for nearly 52% of all abortions (1,400 black babies each day). Those in this country who love life, who love the precious promises of God, are anxious to assist in finding homes and adoptions for these children who might just be the next Pope, President, pastor or the presenter of some great scientific discovery or source of entertainment.
The founder of the Methodist Church in this country, John Wesley, was crossing the ocean on a ship at a time of storm. He was scared beyond words, yet he noticed a group of Mennonites who acted unafraid, busy singing hymns. After the storm, he asked them why they showed no fear during the storm. One said, “The same God who takes care of us in the calm, takes care of us in the storm. It is all His business.”


There are one million handicapped citizens in America. As just one of these disabled people (I am a totally blind 100% disabled service connected veteran), it took awhile but I have learned to walk by faith not by sight. I had rather walk with God through the darkness of blindness with its isolation and cruelness than walk in bright daylight with 20/20 vision, alone. When I go to the Veterans’ Hospital and see the phalanx of wheelchair-bound veterans, the scars of wounds (there are not that many blind, usually, when there, I am the only one), I rejoice in the knowledge that we were fortunate enough to live in a country worth fighting for, dying for and living for in a haze of disability. I still believe the greatest heroes of this nation are the mothers and fathers who were brave enough to have and raise children and empower them with the training and education necessary to make this the most blessed nation in history.


When I go in my yard and hear birds singing, when in a distance I can hear the laughter of children, I have the assurance that God has empowered animals, human, domestic and wild to survive. With all the technology of artificial color, synthetic mediums, corruptible personalities and behaviors, substitutes for the reality of God have not been discovered. The singing of birds, the laughter of children are still the best symphonies known to the auditory nerve system.


When the new Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, accepted the Margaret Sanger Award (founder of Eugenics and Planned Parenthood), her husband (the first Black President according to Toni Morrison), forgot that Margaret Sanger called Black people “weeds” and racist Sanger like Charles Darwin, felt they should be exterminated. To the uninitiated, everything is obscure. Mr. Obama‘s Saul Alinsky in his book “Rules For Radicals” “the scripture” on which Mr. Obama is evidently basing his Presidency, isolates targets and just works towards them. The voters who have put him and his ilk in power and have empowered him to turn this country into a “changed” Socialist “pawn shop” will be empowered by their conscience and the wrath of Almighty God to repent for this empowerment and the forsaking of every principle of integrity that made this country great. For those of us who wore the uniform, who bear the marks of battle, those of you who empowered the present administration, have sufficiently insulted us as individuals and as a group.

Black Death

The Black Death, 1347-1351, wiped out half the population of Europe and over one hundred million of the world‘s population. Scholars question and debate much of the details of the Plague but it is believed to have started through the fleas of rats. It led to the morbidity of the most innocent of the population including the poorest and contributed to the ruin of many religions including decimation of the Catholic Church. There have been recurrences of this Plague in other places in Europe, and indeed around in the world such as in Spain and Italy.  Much later America was affected by the Plague mostly in San Francisco where there was much death and rats which could be seen running down ropes of ships being tied in the port facility were a scourge on the city. It was a horrible form of death and like all pandemics tested the social fabric of health and commerce.

Europe again, is in a state of despair mostly due to their own inattention to immigration and border control by an influx of Muslims, mostly African, who risk life trying to find a better existence in European countries.  Most, like refugees from Cuba, are trying to get to America on makeshift floating devices or refugees from Mexico and other Latin American countries trying to get to America through tunnels, over or under fences, the exploitation of the human psyche and the determination for finding a better life, has led to untold hardship and death. Just last week, a ship carrying many Africans sank. A container carrying many was discovered with most of them dead. The risk involved in trying to find a better life here on this earth can be compared to the risk of eternal damnation for the unrepentant soul.

Much of Europe’s trouble is self-imposed because of the desire for cheap labor from the Muslim countries of Turkey and those in North Africa.  Instead of going back home, they stay.  One of the largest mosques in the world is now located in Cologne, Germany.  The Muslims’ have many babies and they do not abort their babies.  Among Westerners, more caskets are manufactured than cradles.  Women in Western Europe have stopped having children, so the Muslims have rapidly taken over.

So many Africans have died trying to cross at Gibraltar that there is little burial ground for the dead. Almost the same situation has happened in the Canary Islands, off the Coast of Africa. With all the problems of colonialism, at least the colonial powers, England, France, Germany, Portugal employed natives in their own native country and introduce housing, streets, social and commercial systems which improves their living standards. I will not go into the sociology of white-owned black rule or black-owned black rule but using South Africa, the wealthiest African nation as an example, matters have not improved, only deteriorated with Black rule. More blacks are unemployed in South Africa now than before Mandela. Living conditions of blacks are worse now than before Mandela.

The African country of Somalia is without government, so terrible that the military from other African countries, who had tried to give some relief, have withdrawn. I remember my absolute consternation when in the Sudan and Ethiopia as I saw the tragedy’s already existing there (nothing compares to present day Darfur) and one of the Sudanese officials saying to me, “ You must go back to your country and try to get us some help. This is a place of complete decimation.”

Of course, as always, in every trip around the world, some reporter was anxious to interview me about the trip. How often, do you find a blind man traveling the world, able to report on conditions? But, as always, until my series of commentaries on my travels, reporters just like to romanticize and talk about the insignificant, such as my crossing one river in Nigeria on an ancient rope bridge. Even my description of the peace corps worker, who I met, along with a British ambassador, who had escaped Charles Taylor’s Liberia with the machete deaths was of no interest.

I described in detail my escape from Kigali in Rwanda where the genocide had just begun (1 million Tutsi were killed by the Hutu’s), where even the United Nations representatives were expelled from the country, and one accompanied me to the airport where we had to fight our way through gangs of young black “head hunters” to get into the airport where we were kept in the superintendents' office with what dire police protection was available. Facilities at the airport, the only one in the country, was behind barbed fenced, the taxi drivers who drove to the airport in a caravan for protection, drove right up to the gate where they formed a gauntlet of protection, as much as possible, for us to get inside.

To this day, just as fresh in my mind as the day it happened, I remember my camera bag hanging around my neck, my white cane and 2 suitcases, being swung side to side trying to protect myself along with the drivers and my guide and the UN officials as we escaped Rwanda into the airport, eventually on the last plane out. I have heard the hatred in the voices of these black people. I know something of the black death and only in the “echo chambers” of hell itself will one hear the cries of the women and children who have fallen victim to the desperation and desolation of the black continent.

Books have been written on the genocide in Liberia, the hell of a 27 year war in Angola, the horror stories of Somalia, the beheading of non-Muslims and the stoning of Muslims in Nigeria. Just this week, photos were shown of a 17 year old girl, held down by adults receiving 39 lashes, for sexual activity against Muslim law.

The world's greatest navy seemingly cannot detect or prevent the hijacking of its flagged ships, but untrained pirates operating from failed boats out of the harbors of a failed country. Have we become so “drugged” that we do not have the mental ability to comprehend what is happening, not only in our own country, but around the world? It does not take a disease such as bubonic plague, the black plague or malaria (from rats and mosquitoes), or starvation. (At the Nigerian airport, the British ambassador said to me, “You stupid Americans send food, why not metal garbage cans for these people to protect their food from rats.”). When will a world of wealth recognize the cries of babies and small children or their desperate mothers in these countries facing black death.

Adventures of War

Checkpoint Charlie was located in the wall dividing East and West Berlin.  The Berlin Wall was 96 miles long, dividing the Eastern-Russian section of Germany from the Allied-Western section of Germany. Checkpoint Charlie was an opening made famous by movies and the media, because it was a symbol of the Cold War. In going from the western side to the eastern side through Checkpoint Charlie, I was amazed at the security measures involved. There were dogs sniffing everything, large mirrors were put under the vehicles to make sure people or contraband was not being moved, everything was searched. The amazing thing, no one from the western side would possibly want to escape to the eastern side and escape from the eastern side to the western side was extremely rare.

Before the division of the city, these people, speaking the same language, enjoying the same history and culture, had fought together under Hitler. It was almost unthinkable that those captured and aligned on the eastern side with the Russians, where life was a bleak struggle for existence would “synapse” with the Russians against their countrymen on the western side of the wall. (Perhaps this was the case of the Stockholm syndrome, where captives become friends with the captors). Western Berlin, not that long after WWII, was one of the most prosperous places I have encountered, in spite of the damage of warfare. Of course, since the “tearing down” of the Wall in more modern history, after a time of cultural problems, the East and West Germans have formed a good union.

King Arthur, a legendary British leader, led the defense of England against the Saxon invasion. In one great battle, hundreds of men were lined up on Arthur’s side ready to go to battle, a short distance opposite, the Saxons were lined up ready for battle. Two front lines of healthy, well armed men who had no knowledge of one another, yet ready to kill each other with the command of their leader. Arthur, seeing the futility of such action, as well as the “waste of war” decided to have a meeting with the opposing commander. Sitting together with their aides, they had worked out a peaceable solution to their problem. When a poisonous snake attacked one of the aides, the aide took his sword to kill the snake. The sun reflecting off the sword was interpreted by both sides as the signal for war, a tremendous battle ensued and only four men of all the hundreds survived, hundreds were dead for no apparent reason.

There will be few survivors after a nuclear blast. All it will take is one deranged person near a switch on a nuclear silo, a coup d’éta in a third world country with nuclear weapons such as Pakistan. A nuclear cloud from just one weapon, and there are thousands, can wipe out civilization.

From ancient history to modern times, there have only been three years in the history of man when a war was not taking place. During the past 500 years, England has been to war 75 times, France has been to war 63 times and Russia 62 times. There was only 21 years between WWI and WWII. During that time, over 4,000 peace treaties were signed.  It cost America $20,000 dollars for each opposing person killed in WWI, it cost America $200,000 dollars for each person killed in WWII. Can one even imagine what it is costing today for each person killed on the opposing side? And can one even think how much it is costing America for each of our finest killed, as well as the thousands who are wounded and must be cared for, for life?

During WWI, one newspaper had the following headline, “Great Battle Fought, Only One Man Killed.” It was only one man for the country, but it was a father, a husband, and a son for one family and a valued member of one community. The grief of such a loss, although only one, was almost unbearable for this one man’s four children, this one man’s wife, and this one man’s parents. Such is war. Many live with war everyday of their life, the blind, the amputee, the mentally inflicted.

You wear your uniform proudly, but you never recover from military service. In a VA hospital, I saw a large sign, “We honor our veterans”. Any veteran who has had the experience of the ineptness and callus service at a VA facility knows, that like the advertisements on TV and radio concerning veterans, that it is just so much talk, and talk is cheap. The only truth from any of these Public Service Announcements: “Freedom is not free.”

War has always been romanticized. In European history, very much like a family dispute, very few people realized that, WWI when England was at war with Germany, Queen Victoria’s grandson was the Kaiser of Germany. Conglomerate corporations on both sides, continued to do business with one another. People of wealth in countries at war just travel to expensive resorts in nations not at war and just “sit the whole thing out”. It has always been the sons of the disenfranchised who have paid the price of war.

Hypocrisy has always been a way of life. Military orders can be changed with the right political influence. I still remember the very handsome, articulate, wealthy, young doctor who had the political influence to get his orders changed so he got my assignment and I got his. In war, as in everything else, it is not what you know, but who you know.

I employed a housekeeper for a long time, a black woman, member of a large black church, she amazed me with details of church activity, the most gruesome. The pastor felt it was his obligation to visit the “widows” and other single women in the church and extend to them sexual attention.

Perversion has become glorified, particularly among young people. The glorification and acceptance of homosexuality, same-sex marriage, increased popularity of a president who did not hide his perversion, has led the entire nation down the path of promiscuity, permissive parenting, and total anti-Christian behavior. The everyday chant and dance, “anything goes” and so has gone the integrity of a blessed nation.

In 1949, a reporter asked Dr. Albert Einstein, “What is the future of nuclear energy?” He said, “If we are still around, ask me in 20 years.” The great preacher Dr. R.G. Lee said, “Most people want to live, but we have produced a generation intent on death.”

Jerusalem

My first trip to Israel, 1965, when approaching the walls of Jerusalem, the Damascus gate, I told my driver to stop the car, that I wanted to walk in. It would be an unusual western Christian who would not have a feeling of absolute joy to enter the most famous city on earth. And, for a committed, born again Christian who is a Bible student and has studied this city and the history of this land, it was a splendor beyond description. Varied archeology and historical details have evolved about the city and its early history. This we know: David seized the city from the Jebusites and it has been the center of religious activity since. Just to walk down the streets of the old city: the smells, the sounds, the reverence of the Jews around the wailing wall is a memorial to the millions of pilgrims who have visited and studied this metropolis which has a population of nearly 1 million.

A very wonderful lady in my life described to me at length a trip by her parents to the “Holy Land” long before planes. They were people of wealth and could afford to travel by ship to the Holy Land, live there for several weeks and travel to the Biblical places of interest while they were in a historically and archaeologically primitive condition unlike today, where tourists arrive by the thousands. I have been to Jerusalem three times and the thrill is still there.

This speaks of a time when there was no historical enjoyment.  This speaks of a time when our blessed Lord was tried by a court of mockery and judicial ineptness, sent to death by the polls of pagans and backsliders, who, then as now, cast their polling vote for a thief. Even today, all the major media outlets would choose Barabbas over Christ. Even today, the slick magazines and the few newspapers left in the country would choose Barabbas over Christ.  Even today, the thieves in political office elected mostly by liberal unbelievers, agnostics, academics, would choose Barabbas over Christ.

Jesus Christ, son of God who created the universe, who put on a tent of human flesh and dwelled among us in absolute perfection, was killed by religious people in consort with pagans. After a deceitful trial, which even the roman conquerors determined a fraud, but popularity as then as now, caused politicians, primitive Roman or modern American, to seek a popular compromise rather then justice. Never in the history of humanity has there been such fraud and fright.

The tearing apart of the most innocent of life inside a mothers womb for the birth control of the heathen, the chopping up of small children by the machete in African tribal disasters for the benefit of heathen power brokers, the suicide bombing, blowing apart the human bodies of women and children just trying to live as an objective for religious control of maniac leaders, come close to what our blessed Lord endured. The difference is, He was the son of God, Savior of the world through whose shed blood, all the sins of the world would be forgiven, a gift of grace that through faith redeemed people would have eternal life. 

700 years before his birth, the prophet Isaiah had described his atonement: Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. (Isaiah 53)

As He dragged His cross, on which He was to be crucified, through the streets of Jerusalem, ( the streets packed with people for this Jewish religious holiday time) He passed by those who had seen Him, from a small boys lunch, feed thousands. He could probably call them by name because as the scripture tells us, our names are written in the very hand of God. As He dragged His cross by women, who were probably shedding tears of compassion, He reminded them that if such is done to a green branch, what will happen to the dry.  As He dragged His cross through the streets of Jerusalem, His feet were probably insecure and He certainly thought of the disabled of time and eternity, the blind, the cripple, who daily walk with uncertain steps. Once when He fell, His cross was thrust on an African slave named Simon from the African country of Cyrene who just happened to be a bystander, who had no idea his name would go down in God’s immortal history demonstrating the blessedness of cross bearing. “Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.” (Matthew 16:24)

“Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” ( Hebrews 12:2)

On the hill just outside Jerusalem, shaped like a skull, our blessed Lord was stripped naked and nailed to the cross. The artist has been so modest in painting a rag around his genital area, but he was hung on this cross before the world naked, beaten, and blooded for our benefit.

Once I helped my father tear down a very old building, probably built before the civil war. The large timbers were joined by the boring and placing of wood spikes, but the metal spikes in the building were not like today’s nails, smooth. Can you even imagine the spikes that were driven through the wrists and ankles of our Lord?

So much of the actions which occurred at Calvary’s tree, can be compared to today’s heresy. They gambled for his one possession, his robe. Today’s lovers of gambling (lottery, poker machines, betting on everything from horses to dogs) would have participated in this Las Vegas type entertainment.  The lovers of strong drink ( Cocktails, wormwood, etc) would have certainly offered Him a drink to ease His pain. And, certainly was the case with the pagans and semi-religious types mocking him on the cross, they would have said, “if you are God, come down.”

I had a very prominent, educated man say to me recently, “If the God you worship is so powerful why do you ask for money and contributions?” In other words, he had no idea of the gift God was giving the world in the sacrifice of His only Son, just as the non-believer had no idea of the joy and worship the Christian received, giving himself and his wealth for God's benefit. And, like the pseudo-religious and pagan people who think the law is the answer to everything, they wanted to make sure the body was taken down before legal observance of the Passover, the legal religious attitude of not touching a dead body, ( As has been so beautifully shown in the Pieta, a masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture by Michelangelo, depicts the body of Jesus on the lap of his mother Mary after the Crucifixion.) As is the case with today’s “church people” who are just playing with God. One is extremely fortunate to have the love of a mother until the end.

About 30 years ago, I was participating of a funeral of one of this states outstanding citizens. One man said to me, “Is your mother still living?” I said “Yes, thank God, but in poor health.” He said, “When you lose your mother you will lose the best friend you ever had.” And, most of His disciples had fled in horror and fear. But the beloved John was still at the foot of the cross. It is a fortunate man, indeed, who still has one friend until the end. Such a good friend, that he could ask him to take care of his mother.

There are many significant, very real, never to be forgotten, blessed memories of this crucifixion, the greatest gift in the history of the world. The event to which all history of the world converges and the event from which all history of the world diverges. One of the more important, for us to remember, in the tomb from which He was resurrected, the Jewish custom of having a napkin over the head, had been observed. The grave clothing in which He was wrapped for burial in this borrowed tomb, were crumpled on the floor, but the napkin, which was over His head was carefully folded by our Lord before his exit. It was the Jewish custom, in home, that when someone arose from the table, if they intend to return to the table they folded their napkin, otherwise if they had finished and did not intend to return they crumpled their napkin. Note: for the blessing of every believer who awaits his return, He folded his napkin, He plans to return. “Even so come quickly Lord Jesus.” (Revelation 22)

Emmanuel Luis

On January 15, 2009, a US Airway flight 1549 made an emergency landing in the Hudson river, in New York City. 155 passengers were safely evacuated from the plane, not one loss of life, not one injury. Photos have appeared online showing the plane going down with much debate about the visibility of the “everlasting arms of God” easing the plane down into the river. Certainly, God was involved, but it is proffered as artistic enhancement about the photo.

For over 20 years, I maintained a co-op apartment which I owned in Manhattan, using it when there, usually about one week each month, mostly as a launching pad for my many trips abroad. It was a very nice place, a friend who had studied interior design in NY had decorated the apartment for me, which was wonderfully located so that I could walk to most places I needed to go. I could ride a bus to other places, and by counting the bus stops, could keep up with my travel. Never once, in all those years did I venture into a subway. A blind person has enough trouble getting around above ground and criminals in NY do not mind robbing a disabled person anymore then a healthy one.

Since my life in the south was so isolated and since all my business arrangements with real estate and other things could be taken care of by one of my assistants, I traveled back and forth to Manhattan and my maintenance in both places was of no great consequence. I kept clothes in both places, but as I’ve told so many, it becomes difficult trying to remember the placement of a jar of mayonnaise and other food articles in the refrigerator or cupboards of two or three houses since in the south, I have both a town house and a beach house. 

Among the many interesting experiences, and the many interesting people I met in Manhattan, some quite famous, such as United Nations personnel.  I was in walking distance, not only of the theatre district, and I have “play bills” from over 250 Broadway plays which I enjoyed, I was within walking distance to several well known churches, Fifth Ave Presbyterian, which I attended most, St Thomas Episcopalian and Calvary Baptist on west 57th Street, where the famous preacher Dr. Donald R. Hubbard was pastor, the church which was established in 1847, still had a marvelous message, wonderful music, etc.

I have found in visiting churches abroad, and even in this nation's large cities, disabled people are more welcomed than in a place that you have lived your entire life. One Sunday at Calvary, a young man came over and sat next to me and introduced himself as Emmanuel Luis. At the end of the service, he told me he would like to talk with me, that he had noticed me as a blind man for several Sundays, and I was the first blind person he had ever met. We walked outside, down the street to a small park and sat on a bench and I heard a story which has changed my life completely. This was in the early 80’s and after many years, I have lost contact with him, I took him to a coffee shop for lunch, met and talked with him many times. (I have learned over the years to never invite anyone to my house who I do not know really well. No one can even imagine how much has disappeared from my house by hiring someone just to clean the house, as well as the risk I take in being alone with someone who I do not know very well)

Emmanuel was from Port-au-Prince Haiti, while still a small child, in the inconceivable morass of chaos that goes on in that poor country, where killing is a normal activity everyday, where life expectancy is 51 years. And where, because of the corruption of police and politics, the people who have historically lived in absolute poverty ever since the French enslaved them, are rich if they have one meal a day. The average income in Haiti is 250 dollars a year. The manner of killing in Haiti, as in Rwanda, Congo and other places in Africa, is the machete. I can think of no more horrible death then being chopped up by a machete. At least if you are blown apart by a suicide bombing, as in Israel and Iraq, it is over very quickly.

A group of killers had come into his home, he was about 5 years of age, about 16 years before I met him, killed everyone including his mother and siblings.  When the police came to investigate, at the request of a neighbor, they had brought the back hoe to dig a hole to put the bodies in. But, one observant police officer noticed that Emmanuel moved an arm and he said, “this one is not dead”. Emmanuel was taken to a hospital run by Catholics, and he survived.

A long story, reared in a Catholic facility, a very bright high school graduate, he was brought to America by a Catholic organization sponsored by the Knights of Columbus. Extremely bright, he had studied at City College and worked part time at Macy’s. His inquiring mind had made him a very astute Bible scholar which is something unusual with Catholic young men. From his study and memorizing and meditating on the scriptures, he could not reconcile the Rosary, confessions to a priest, and the communion service as is believed by Catholics. He had a most remarkable knowledge of God’s word. I would refer to a scripture in a certain epistle and he would immediately recite the entire chapter.

He met someone at the store who invited him to services at Calvary, where he found what he was searching for. He found that his repentance, once for all, his baptism, once for all, his acceptance of grace through faith and his membership with this church was all sufficient for his spiritual needs. Of course, like most young people who live in NY, he had financial needs. I introduced him to the “thrift shop” where I bought my clothes (At the time, just off 1st Ave almost under the 57th bridge a shop sponsored by “Planned Parenthood”, an organization which I despise, but it did have good buys in clothing and other items of interest to me, such as prints, old books and old dishes.  I had discovered the place accidentally in looking for a shoe repair shop.) He was amazed to find large vats of clothing, shirts, etc, which were almost like new. (I personally do not own one shirt that costs over 25 cents. Every article of clothing that I own, suits, jackets, ties, etc, comes from such a place. It must have been 25 years since I bought anything new to wear except for a pair of athletic shoes which I bought online.)

He had become interested in a young woman in the church who I met and who I evaluated as being more interested in his good looks and intellectual capacity then anything else. It did not take me long to ascertain that like, most young women in NY, she was just “playing church” and had found she was more secure in meeting a man in a church situation than the “bar scene” type situation.

There was a fast food restaurant not far from my apartment and I would meet him there for a meal and often he would accompany me to a performance such as “Radio City Music Hall“. He needed a father figure in his life, he needed someone with whom he could talk about many things, he needed guidance and, since, he did not have one relative in America ,his only contacts, since he had left the security of the catholic regimen, was a few people at the church and at work.

His brilliant mind yearned for academic excellence and I encouraged him to continue at City College where he could get the professional standing he would have to gain for this world. I further told him, that he had been fortunate to keep his sanity from the horrors of Haiti and to have escaped the disaster of the western world. My great fear with him, as with so many young men, is the central, sexual drive of youth. I encouraged him to differentiate between love and lust. I explained to him, in great detail, the lifelong trauma of a marriage disaster. If I had only known beforehand what I learned much later, my life would have been a different experience  Staying in New York as little as I did, I was unable to give him the counseling and life experience he was gaining the very hard way.

His empathy for me was greater than any I have experienced from anyone in my life, family or otherwise. The world famous “Light house for the Blind” was on E 59th Street just a few blocks from my house on E 56th Street. At that time, all of my vision in my right eye had been gone since the war but I still had a shadow in the left eye.( Small island of active retina)   He was amazed that the place treated me so causally.  I told him about the experience I had already been through at the New York University School of Optometry and how casually they had treated me even though I had known Dr. Alden Haffner, the Dean of the school.  He learned, just as I have learned, the money and facilities raised through the largess of the taxpayer or philanthropist goes into the pockets of the individuals fortunate enough to have a job at those places.

Any Hippocratic oath or other expected mercy for needy people falls through the cracks of hypocrisy as they prefer the opulent extravagance of their own lifestyle. If money solved problems in the field of experimentation most diseases and disabilities would have been conquered long ago. There are too many people living too well on money given for research for most of these researchers to be concerned with those in need. Just as Eve was beguiled by Satan, money has a beguiling effect on those equipped to provide help. Just as the French enslaved the people of Haiti and they are still living in enslavement, we are seeing enslavement here by the greedy who have little compassion for the needy.

I sold my property in Manhattan in 1986, shortly after my last around the world trip. By letter, I continued to hear from Emmanuel and he often spoke of coming south. He had finished his business degree at City College and was making plans to do graduate work at Columbia. His zeal for the Lord, his still bringing questions of theology to my attention was as intense as when he and I talked together. If we only had cell phones at that time I could have had daily contact with him. My salvation is the only thing in which I am totally secure, but if he were not totally redeemed and completely straight in his attitude toward life, I have never known one with who I have had more confidence.

I told him, over and over, to recite these two versus every morning of his life: The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and fell. (Psalm 27:1-2)

(This commentary was written years ago, before the Port-au-Prince earthquake)

I Did It My Way

Acapulco is one of my favorite places in the world. The last time I was there, Queen Elizabeth also made her appearance there. She proceeded up the Pacific Coast to spend some time at President Reagan’s ranch. Out on a boat in Acapulco Bay, my guide said “Up on that cliff is the magnificent home of Frank Sinatra.“ Of course, he knew I couldn’t see, but he described the house for me. Once, in Jerusalem, staying at the Hilton Hotel, I was talking with the late Totie Fields and her husband.  Totie was already in a wheelchair at that time and this was probably her last trip. Sinatra passed by in his golfing clothes and, of course, said hello to Totie.  One of my employees accompanied Sinatra from his plane at the airport to the university auditorium here when he performed some years ago. He said, “You know he is a very old man and he acts like an old man until he gets on stage. But when he was on stage he was totally different from the man I brought from the plane and took back to the plane.” When my lawyer was finishing some paper work on my estate, he said, “I’m going to put the Sinatra clause in your papers, that if anyone challenges your estate they will get nothing.”  He said, “Sinatra made sure his heirs would not quibble over his property.”

Sinatra made the song famous that all people will sing on their way to Hell, “ I Did It My Way.” The Garden of Eden was a paradise, Adam and Eve had everything they needed plus the companionship of God. But, as is always the case when things are going well, Satan has a way of making his appearance, and the scripture says “He beguiled Eve” and Eve, instead of saying to Satan “ I’ll let you talk to my husband,” she tried to handle things herself and brought on the humanity of the world all the problems which we face everyday. And, the first hen-pecked man on earth, Adam, blamed everything on his wife.

Pride precedes every sin and Eve had enough pride to think she could handle Satan. Sin is always beautiful and pleasant for a season, but always costs more than it's worth.  There is always some pleasure in sin for a time, the forbidden fruit was beautiful, tasty, very desirable. The forbidden fruits in our lives are always attractive and we feel do no harm.

I was a college freshman when I saw my first television set. Living way out in the country, we were fortunate to have a radio. At Chapel Hill, some boys in the dormitory said, “We can go to a furniture store down on Franklin Street and watch Carolina play Notre Dame at the Polo Grounds in New York, that store has a new television set.”  Years later, speaking before a youth conference at a Baptist meeting, I said, “if Satan had desired to invent something to make people just as mean as possible, he would have designed and invented a television set.” I had no idea how prophetic my words were at that time. This one electric instrument has become the idol of the American home. The average child watches five hours a day.  Most adults spend more time than that with their television set. The modern television set has channels for everything.  One of my employees, who also worked for a television repair shop, said, “there is more pornography watched on television than anything else.”

I remember my first experience at a “dirty book” store. I was in Copenhagen, Denmark at the famous Grand Railroad Station in the City Center, the station seen in so many WWII movies.  A friend with me said, “The porno section of the city is over to the right of the station” and so like Eve, beguiled by the serpent, I walked over there with him and saw stall after stall of pornographic magazines and pictures.

Years later, I saw the same type of thing in Greenwich Village in New York City and some years later, on the back streets of this “Bible Belt” Southern city in which I have lived most of my life.  But, today, the dirty book stores have all moved inside your own house.  There is no pornography known in Hollywood, Copenhagen, New York City that cannot be found just by pushing a few buttons on your own personal computer.  It is addictive.  I have had grown men, taxi cab drivers and such, reveal to me just how much time they spend watching pornography.  And, it is not just a male addiction, in a recent poll, 30% of all females admitted that they watch pornography.

You are just as capable as me in researching the number of divorces in this country, births to unwed mothers in this country, rape and molestation statistics in this country, the number of men in prison (that you are supporting at the rate of $45,000 per year) for rape, molestation and even murder in the name of lust, mostly brought on by pornography. Every lustful, sexual, sinful thought starts in the mind often with the enabling effect of alcohol or some other drug. A female or male will yield to the temptation of illegal sexual behavior, without considering the consequences.  We must consider this, when we consider the 3,500 babies aborted each day in this country (1,400 black babies) and the fact that although the black population is only 13% of the total, 52% of all abortions are black babies and 70% of all prison inmates are black males, to say nothing of the 70% of Black females who have STDs (sexually transmitted diseases).

One of my friends, a prominent Black physician, a medical officer in the Army with me, said to me recently, “The black race is being eradicated by AIDs and abortion.”  Most new cases of HIV Aids are black male and female.  These are the facts and we might as well face the truth.  The truth is the truth whether anyone wants to hear it or not.  Those who practice sexual promiscuity can sing, “I Did It My Way.”

In Trafalgar Square in London there is a tremendous monument to Lord Nelson, leader of the British Navy. Perhaps his greatest naval battle led to the defeat of Napoleon. The word swept through England that Nelson had defeated Napoleon. But a point of great tourist interest in Paris is the Tomb of Napoleon, both of these great minds knew victory and defeat. Every human experience results in either victory or defeat.  You become a victor over your emotions or you can become a victim of your emotions. In sexual promiscuity your defeat often results in the hurt of so many others. Proud parents of both male and female children rejoice in the union of purity knowing they had the discipline to wait until marriage instead of running the risk of pregnancy, and the hurt of producing a child out of wedlock. God was not joking when he said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” (Matthew 5)

Some years ago, an attractive young woman worked for me, very capable of doing her job, who had three children at home, all by different fathers, and she had never been married to a man. I told her one day, “If you think your children will forget your life style when they are older, you are very wrong.” This developed after a news account of one child’s father firing a weapon at another child’s father when they were checking on their children at her house and she was busy in a back bedroom with another, newer boyfriend. Another secretary told me that she never wanted to see her biological mother, that “as a child, she would often come home from school and her mother would be entertaining a man in the house and she was told to go and stay at a neighbor’s house.” She said, “I did not want to go to the neighbor’s house and they did not want me.” Can you imagine such a tramp for a mother? You see, these women decided to “Do it ‘their’ way”, to the degradation of their own children.  Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you. (1 Peter 5:7)

I do not believe Thomas Jefferson, the second President of the United States, was a Christian, but he had a great appreciation for God’s Word as long as he, perhaps our most brilliant President, agreed with His Word. We have all heard about Jefferson’s Bible. Jefferson with a blade, excised all the scripture out of his Bible with which he did not agree. Often, radio commentators and even ministers of the Gospel will say, referring to the Bible, I do not think this or that or, I do not agree with this. It does not matter what you think or with what scripture you agree, the Holy Word of God is inerrant, omnipotent, omniscient.“Thy word is forever settled in Heaven.”(Psalm 119:89)

The broad way that leads to eternal destruction, and many are on it including all the liars and those who support the liars and the abortionists, the thieves and the hypocrites in and out of government will sing, all the way to Hell, “I Did It My Way.” Those in Sodom, were probably singing that tune when the city was forever erased from the earth.

Images

In Helen Keller’s 1904 book, she made the following statement which has strengthened me in my daily existence as a totally blind person: “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.”

Character determines destination.  I praise God everyday of my life, and after you get my age you realize how quickly life goes by, that I have been chosen not only to believe in God, but to share in His suffering. Helen Keller never saw or heard anything, but she had a knowledge of human nature that God alone could understand.

After over 40 years of total blindness, I still have the mental images, which I prize more highly than gold, of what I saw when I was sighted. These images come to me in the isolation of dreams, as well as the reality of everyday life. I am thinking today of an aged black woman I met when I was about 20 years of age. I have some relatives and friends who are very much ashamed of their early poverty. I have a sister and brothers who, because of their education and hard work, are now very wealthy, live in magnificent homes, are members of wonderful country clubs, who do not like to be reminded of their poverty in their youth. It has never bothered me, I do not mind in the least reminding my contacts that mine has been a life of poverty and hard work. But, like my parents and grandparents before me, we did not stay in this economic condition. You are not stuck where you start. In speaking before large and small groups, I can assure anyone that hard work and clean living, depending on the mercy of God, will result in prosperity if God so desires.

I worked my way through 8 years of University education and I am not ashamed of the hard work, which not only helped me with a remarkable education, but brought me into contact with individuals who I will never forget. From selling Bibles door to door, up and down every “pig path” in Eastern NC, to 8 around the world trips, passport being stamped in 157 countries, I have made the acquaintance of human beings which has brought a wealth to my life, that most individuals can never experience.

On a hot summer day in 1950, selling Bibles in a remote area of Eastern NC, to the best of my memory, a dirt road near the black river, I left my 1941 Plymouth ( a car for which I paid $85), and went up on the front porch of a very modest farm house. An aged black woman was sitting on her porch in a rocking chair, it turns out that Ms. Rosella was 95 years of age.  Of course, this was before the war and I could see at that time. She bore all the marks of a hard life, but had the pleasant countenance of the saintly disposition I learned in our conversation.

She was delighted to talk to a Bible salesman because she had a definite love affair with the word of God and with our Savior. Her first comments were, “Son, if I miss out on heaven I have really missed out.” Then, she told me much of her life story.  Her husband had been killed in a logging accident, deep in the woods (logging is the cutting of trees for lumber) at the age of 35, leaving her with four young children, two boys and two girls. She said, “We were already poor and could barely survive, what was I to do now?”

She continued to work, doing anything, anywhere, to support the family.  The members of her poor country church and a few white families in the community had helped bury her husband.  She said, “Like a squirrel, I started preparing for the winter.”  The boys would go throughout the wooded areas and bring back any limbs or anything burnable for a wood pile to keep a stove going for cooking and for heat during the winter. The girls would pick any kind of berries, any type fruit that had fallen on the ground, and at night she would wash, peel and prepare the fruit for drying in the sun during the day. She had learned to weave baskets from weeds that grew along the river bank so the dried blue berries and black berries, apples and pears, she stored in baskets in the attic under the tin roof. Her husband had already built some rabbit box traps before he died and so each morning the boys would get the rabbits, possums, or other wild animals out of the traps which she skinned, salted and dried for meat.

The white farm family who owned the house in which she lived had given her assurance that she and her children could keep living there ( the very house and porch on which I was sitting) as long as she assisted with their farm and housework. The lady who inherited the property for whom she gave care until her death made all the legal arrangements to insure her living in the house for her life.

Now, getting back to survival, a widowed black woman with four children, all in school.  She said, “I understand the disciple Thomas had calluses on his knees from spending so much time in prayer, mine were the same way. Praying for my children to stay well because there was never money for doctors.”

“We would take our baskets and like the women in the Bible, would go over the fields getting any corn, beans, potatoes, anything that was left after the regular harvest of the crops.”

“My children wore “patched” clothes to school, “hand downs” from the white families in the community, but they were always clean and they all made good grades.  When each of my children graduated from high school the entire school community would join me in “shouting”, like I was in church.” 

“In all these years of survival and raising the children, we walked to church which was two miles away, never missed one Sunday and my seating space on the second pew from the front, is marked by a flower stand attached to the pew where someone in the church places a flower in my honor every Sunday. They have assured me this would continue to be done after my “graduation”. I always had chickens, eggs, a garden which produced wonderful produce which I dried and canned. All four of my children received scholarships for college and all four are still in the teaching profession. I have twelve grandchildren and the greatest pride of my existence is I have two grandsons that are medical doctors.  All of my grandchildren are college graduates.”

She wanted one of my large print Bibles and since I would take no money for it, she gave me one of her woven grass baskets, which I still own.  I asked her to give me her favorite verse from the Bible and now I give it to you.
“I will sing of the mercies of the LORD for ever: with my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness to all generations.” (Psalm 89:1)