120801 22:11 election

"No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent."
- Abraham Lincoln

One might feel safe in the assumption that I am political. But I am so only in the Quaker sense: "Speak Truth to Power" I find myself increasingly concerned with indications obvious to me the psychological manipulation of the electorate.

I am a registered voter and, as indicated, when I get around to it, I will become once more an Independent. Since I feel it will make those who seek power work harder to manipulate me into giving into their addictions.

Without equivocation greed is the most obscene and grotesque aspect of humanity. In a profound sense it is exercised as economic terrorism by the few against the many.

And as I write this I have in mind not simply  Niccolo Machiavelli  (1469-1527) “Ambition is so powerful a passion in the human breast, that however high we reach we are never satisfied. .” indicative of addiction; the operative word is "satisfied" or "never enough." When earnestly asked of those who purport to serve us how much power they want -- inevitably the answer is "MORE!"

When required to define their posture the reply is "more jobs for Americans" yet it is these very people who have moved our industrial genius to other nations in order to glean more profit ignoring the problem of what money is for: a medium of exchange for goods and services in order to drive the economy forward.

My sense is quite grim since I well know that hospice will be, in the very near future, a Growth Industry dealing with the already epidemic levels of dementia & Alzheimer's essentially induced by chemical substances inimical to human consumption increasing profits across the board.

Both Democrats and Republicans want to control the news media while saying on one hand that deregulation is indicated to increase jobs and on the other some other bull roar about censorship of the Internet.

I had not intended to attempt a definitive essay on elections or the economy. This is a selection of afterthoughts from a conversation with a fellow volunteer at hospice and his concerns about 'them' meaning the obvious  destruction of freedom and life livable . . . a person unwilling to live and die for something will stand anything to avoid the issues plaguing our nation and the world.

Collectively we are near checkmate upon a chess board covered with would be Kings. This is no game people, you, me, all of us, are dying because of avarice a Cardinal Sin.

Avarice n extreme greed for riches, immoderate desire for wealth; cupidity
syn avariciousness, greed, rapacity, covetousness
related deadly sin, mortal sin - an unpardonable sin entailing a total loss of grace; "theologians list seven mortal sins" greed - excessive desire to acquire or possess more (especially more material wealth) than one needs or deserves
Quotations
"The love of money is the root of all evil" Bible: I Timothy
"avarice, the spur of industry" [David Hume Essays: Moral and Political]

©2012 by Jack Spratt All Rights Reserved

120801 02:34 Judas Iscariot

I have arisen from a dream which defines me in ways difficult to accept as Judas Iscariot. Inherent in the dream's message was the role of avenger for the deaths of God' Children of which, of course, we all are. Yet some seem called to devour in greed everything in sight.

There are certain aspects of my personality that I am not comfortable with since it implies, at least to me and with my powers of discernment, that I am less benign than my ideal of man god or Jesus.

Baptized Methodist, an occasional Congregationalist, then for a long period of time attendance to no church. Then briefly Baptist and finally my last sincere attendance: The Episcopal Church of America. What I call and sense The Anglican Communion profoundly based upon the absence of a Pope. Or simply: Pro - test - tant.

Without artifice or conceit or intent to promote or advance any specific theology save the significance of Free Will for all, which at the moment, seems the left hand of love, mercy, compassion, empathy, kindness and sacrifice. There is virtually no part of me indifferent to anything.

"God helps those who help themselves"?!

As man and child I have been victim and helpless to stave off the deaths of anything or anyone yet in prayer have I plead to be the one to die in their stead. Simultaneously aware that my sense of death was then simply what it implies: dead and buried, this body to rot -- end of story. Add to which my sense of Jesus or any of the characters within the narrative of The Bible -- Both Books -- The Old and New Testament from beginning to end there is zero sentimentality. What I have come to perceive as idolatrous idolatry of ideas used to sell a belief system and not promote faith. . . .And in faith I would be for God anything God, in His infinite will for me for all mankind decided. . . .Even Judas Iscariot.

Spiritually and intellectually I've wandered far afield of "Christianity" without censure of Our Father. If anything, encouragement to know the divinity inherent in all Prophets who define God differently than I was formerly comfortable with. Yet each stripped of their costumes, difficult to understand languages and customs I discovered a common thread. A will to know, love and submit in life, worship and death "God."

Through, possibly, inappropriate confession, through the agency, or venue, of these pages I have proven my imperfection and ordinary humanity fully conscious of my intention to enable others to know themselves divine of origin. Instead of all the lies explicit to me at least in the various brands of human experience and thought -- the what we are willing to live by and die for in real flesh and blood terms -- I would suggest that you must decide not in belief but faith a choice.

You, though I know you not specifically, are worth my life to teach you the value God given within you.

Chortling here at my temptation to quote the wisdom of another, a Buddhist Master, since it seems now that I must write it myself incomprehensible or not.

What you love incarnates what you will become. I have a cat named Annie but I in loving her will no more be a cat than her love for me makes her human . . . I should have said I have a companion a cat named Annie and in our love for each other incarnate God's love for all life.

"When we love properly, we expand our love for a few to compassion for all. This love can help all beings to live with happiness and freedom, and it is anything but small and powerless–it is the reason for our existence!" --Buddhist Master

04:42 Pause

Typical of my practice I seek affirmation in quotes, and there were several that seemed indicative of what I sought, yet simultaneously I discerned a need to close with my own:

Read the runes and ruins of your heart carefully since the reckoning is soon for all of us.

©2012 by Jack Spratt All Rights Reserved

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judas_Iscariot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Judas

If the rich could hire other people to die for them, the poor would make a wonderful living.
- Jewish proverb