I am not bothered in the least that Mitt Romney is a Mormon.

You know, Mormonism is a cult.  Such is a claim with quite a lot of traction in Southern Baptist churches, anyway.  I got that at least twice that I can remember during my adolescence in such a church (which, despite its shortcomings, was more good than bad for me).  I’ve had two people express that concern to me about Mitt Romney.  One is still gaga for our dear Barack, so her vote isn’t in play anyway.  However, she wondered about what kind of effect that might have with Southern religious voters, to which my response was a hearty “none.”  Think about it:  wouldn’t folks who think Romney’s in a cult be the same folks who think Obama’s a stealth Muslim?

So where are they going to go anyway?

And to anyone who’s genuinely, first and foremost put off by Romney being a Mormon:  seriously?  Can you really find anything in that narrative that’s any more objectively ridiculous than any other major religion?  Now I know it’s trendy and probably metrosexual or something to be a jackass loudmouth atheist.  But good luck finding a major presidential candidate without a Judeo-Christian profession.

So within that framework, you’re going to excoriate a guy because there’s a bit more to the story of his faith than that of a “normal” Christian?

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Sometime before Christmas, Lea said something to me about a traveling exhibit there.  Now she probably explained the whole thing to me, but what I carried forward from it was “stained glass.”  So she said something about wanting to go this week, and I thought “oh yeah, the stained glass.”  Sure.  Let’s go.  Thursday got the nod.

Oh, what a marvelous trip!  The exhibit is In Company with Angels:  Seven Rediscovered Tiffany Windows.

The Cincinnati church of which these windows were part was demolished in 1964, and though some of the parishioners had the foresight to save the windows, they’ve been kind of sitting around here and there in barns and sheds and such until their rediscovery 10 years ago and subsequent restoration.  The angels are based on seven letters written to the seven Christian churches of Asia Minor identified in the Book of Revelation: Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.

I won’t go into too much detail here, partially because I want to leave discoveries for folks who go, but mostly because nothing I could say approaches the experience of seeing them.

Speaking of:  locals, you have two weeks left.  These windows are magnificent and absolutely worth the trip to the museum.

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For to us a child is born; to us a son is given.  And the government shall be on his shoulders.  And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. – Isaiah 9:6

Merry Christmas to you and your family.

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As I type at midday on Christmas Eve 2011, I have—this entire season—completely avoided every single annoying Christmas song there is.

I mean completely.  I’ve not heard “Feliz Navidad” once.  Not a single piercingly annoying bar of “Wonderful Christmastime” has sullied my auditory canal.  That stupid hippopotamus song?  Nope.  And any cackle you’ve had at that wacky Grandma having too much eggnog has not been shared with me.

I’ve even avoided the minor irritations.  Seems like there’s some Mariah Carey song with Macaulay Culkin acting a fool in the video I used to hear. “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree?” “Jingle Bell Rock”?  “Santa Baby,” which is good for two listens and then grates forever?  All absent from my Christmas season experience this year.

Are you jealous?

I didn’t set out to do it.  I just noticed about a week ago that it had happened that way.  Looking good to be able to maintain it, too.  Headed to church in a bit, with a budding Christmas Eve dinner tradition to follow, so the rest of today seems safe.  None of our usual Christmas Day activities necessarily include third party-selected soundtrack, either.

I like it.

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Paul’s position is essentially that the United States has enemies in the Middle East because we meddle.  If we’d stop bombing and invading and just mind our own business, then we wouldn’t have an Islamist terror problem anymore.  I find this quite naive, mostly because I think it pretends to know too much about what our respective goals and objectives are.  The assumption is that everyone in the world is wired that way—or if there are dissenters, there aren’t enough to matter—and that if we’ll all just leave each other alone, we’ll have trade agreements and the honey will flow and so forth.

The problem is that far too many people have a fire in the belly that explicitly tells them not to leave folks alone.  This can be one of the oldest sentiments there is:  “I’m going to take that because I want it and I don’t believe you can stop me.”  Perhaps more germanely, it can be a drive to implement sharia law (and you know, I can’t think about sharia at all without chuckling at the memory of all those shrieking “theocracy” during the Bush administration).  I think there are dangerous levels of both out there, and I think it takes the biggest kid on the block imposing his will to keep them in check.

Consequently I reject utterly any notion of parity as a guiding principle in foreign policy.  Mutually beneficial is best, of course, and that’s possible with many nations.  (Gee, that list of “many nations” tends to include those with similar values to ours.  Coincidence?  Ha!)  But if impossible, then American interests prevail.  And when I consider that America imposing its will tends to have as its goal the lack of someone inferior imposing his will, I prefer it to any plausible alternative.  We’re not going to have a globe of equals.  We’re going to have the biggest kid calling a lot of the shots, and so I want to be the biggest kid.

Ugly American?  All right.  If you insist.

There is certainly still plenty of discussion for reasonable people.  Whence nation-building?  We can talk about whether the United States should “(embark) on decades-long, trillion-dollar campaigns to make them love us” or “quick ten-million-dollar lessons in why they should fear us,” as John Derbyshire so eloquently expressed.  I definitely tend toward the second position.  Radical Islamists, or two-bit dictators, or whoever can hate America all they want, and as long as that hatred also contains a goodly dose of fear, it doesn’t bother me a whit.

No greater friend; no worse enemy.

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Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever. – Psalm 107:1

Warm wishes to you and your loved ones this Thanksgiving Day.

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Occasionally I think about things like how old my dad was when things in his life happened.  Mom’s been gone for ten years; at 40, Dad’s mom had been gone for 21.  I’m two years older than Dad was when he and my mother divorced.  However, the ages of my children, and the length of my marriage, are essentially identical.  I’m about the same age now that he was when he decided “what he was going to be when (he) grew up.”  I’m about to start my 19th year in the same occupation, and I still love going to work in the morning.

We’ve done things differently, he and I.  He’s less risk-averse than I am, for one (big) thing.  That’s meant less stability, but greater rewards, in his professional life.  Sometimes I’ve wondered whether, and to what degree, he’s looked disapprovingly on the somewhat safer paths I’ve chosen.  But you know what?  He told me not long ago over a whiskey that he was proud of me for being such a conscientious father, and that he sometimes considered whether he’d been there enough for us.

I was moved and humbled by that, because he was and is a great dad.  I also related to it, because I think I can look mostly objectively on how I do things as a father and feel pretty good, but it’s not a long walk to a scary neighborhood where I’m riddled with guilt at things I remember not doing so well.  (You know, guilt gets a bad rap.  I don’t think it should consume, but why can’t it motivate?)

So when I take inventory, on the negative side:  I’m sitting here managing that guilt, working on not being a fat guy anymore, and trying to get a bit more of a leg up on some things I need to finish around the house.  On the positive side:  I have a strong marriage, healthy children, good friends, a job I enjoy, a warm church home, a father who is still making me a better person, and the objective knowledge that my “negative side” list is full of mere details.

In short, most of the time I have peace, and I am deeply thankful for it.  I know too many who are tormented by its absence.

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Tebow’s in the news right now because he’s gotten the nod as the starting quarterback for the Broncos.  His first game out in that role he dug a deep hole, but then climbed out of it.  He’s 1-0, but it’s ugly.  So this has inflamed all of the usual can-he-make-it-in-the-NFL talk concerning his release, his drop-back ability, and so forth.

Fine.  Fair.  But he’s getting a different sort of attention, too.

If you know anything about Tebow besides that he’s a gifted athlete, you probably know that he’s an unapologetic Christian.  However, he is outspoken only to the degree that he talks about it freely when asked.  Mostly, he simply appears to live his faith to an admirable degree, of which most of us fall short.  (Ever been to the Philippines to help poor children (three years)?  I haven’t.  Save yourself for marriage?  I didn’t.)  He is a young man who appears to be genuinely, sustainedly motivated to try to be the hands and feet of Christ.

And he’s hated for that.

I’ve been chewing on two pieces this week, both posted on Facebook where I could see them.  First I read this one, and wasn’t sure what it was talking about.  Though I pay more attention to the NFL than I have in some time, I’m still not a big fan/voracious reader on it, and hadn’t encountered any non-football anti-Tebow sentiment as this piece discussed.  (I mean, there was the Super Bowl commercial, but I’m talking about sustained, standing around hating on the guy.)  Then I saw this one.

Wow.  How have we gotten here?  Is it really as simple as Tebow makes us see our shortcomings in unusually clear focus, and that’s not pleasant, so screw him?  Part of me fears that it is.  Another part of me thinks there are folks who would delightedly associate sick freaks like Westboro Baptist with Christianity in an effort to discredit it, and Tebow is an overwhelmingly positive witness for Christ, so he must be denigrated.  (I kind of wonder whether those sentiments aren’t two sides of the same thing.  Might be another post coming on that sometime.)

Have we really come to a place where we have so obvious a hero for our young people—indeed, for any of us—and he must be trashed and dismissed so we can get back to discussing the finer points of Lindsay Lohan’s probation?

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I have so far concluded that it’s run-of-the-mill, predictably-stoked wealth envy and class warfare.  (When The Nation is calling it the most important thing happening in the world, you can be pretty certain it’s receiving some heavy-duty PUUUUUUUUUSH from the clowns to the left of you.)  Our esteemed president has signaled that he intends to attempt to smear Romney with it.  (I am shocked that a hard-left ideologue would try to use class warfare as a political weapon, aren’t you?)  Finally, it seems pretty clear to me that they’re considerably more vulgar and enamored of much less personal hygiene than your typical Tea Party crowd.

Well, they are filthy hippies.  I kid, I kid!  You know, mostly.

Here’s the thing, folks.  You can throw all of the endlessly fascinating charts showing supposedly grave inequalities at me that you want.  You can find heart-rending anecdote after heart-rending anecdote allegedly illustrating that decent, solid people with good work ethics can’t get ahead because the deck is so stacked against them.  I shall continue to calmly maintain that the most reliable path to a comfortable living is a willingness to work hard.

That’s the truth most of the time.

Consequently, to the extent that I believe the government should be involved in legislating here at all, it should be with that at the forefront.  Consequently, to the extent that I believe the government should be involved in educating here at all, it should be with that at the forefront.

Consequently, it’s tough for me to discern anything truly resonant with thinking, reasonable people in the rhetoric I’ve encountered, so far, of the average “Occupier.”

Now I certainly did not grow up rich, but some good things happened to me by the grace of God.  I have never disputed that.  I am highly intelligent, and I had a conscientious mother and father who recognized that and nurtured it.  I had a father who made the tough call to move our family to northern Alabama right before my junior year in high school, and increased opportunity for me and his stepchildren was a significant factor in his thinking.

I was making $6 an hour at a bookstore when I moved into my first apartment, and things were tight.  More than once, I had a weekly food budget of $10 or so.  But I don’t pretend I was ever truly poor, because had I ever been in imminent danger of being hungry or cold, my father would have helped me.  I’m glad he never had to, but I don’t minimize the confidence boost that knowledge gave me.

(I also had a father who worked his ass off and didn’t teach me to resent rich people, by the way.)

I’m confident that a lot of these malcontents squatting at these gatherings can tell similar stories, if not better ones.  To anyone who had it significantly worse, I offer that our government has never in history offered more legs up—from student grants to small business loans—to anyone willing to pull a load.  If you want a better life, for the most part, it’s out there to get.

If you work.

For those of you working and making a good living, isn’t it nice?  Want more?  Work harder.  Take risks.  Sacrifice.  Did you know that’s what most rich people really do?  (You know, as opposed to sitting around lighting Cohibas with $100 bills, swilling 20-year-old Scotch, and thinking up ways to screw poor people?)

That’s the truth most of the time.

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And it’s not conducive to a particularly stimulating post tonight.  Sorry about that.  Have a good weekend.  Be back soon.

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