When the Government Kidnaps Children

I've been trying for awhile to think about what I want to say about the whole children-being-separated-from-their-parents business. So here it goes: It's despicable. It's despicable that it's happening. It's despicable that so many of these so-called "pro-life" advocates aren't also pro-family. I had rather imagined that "pro-life" and "pro-family" go hand-in-hand. (I'm not talking about ALL pro-life advocates, of course. But you'll notice that every politician who supports these separations are quote-unquote "pro-life.") It's despicable that all the people who kept claiming, "No no! ALL lives matter!" don't actually believe that ALL lives matter. It's despicable that our president has literally, factually lied, saying this policy is leftover from the Obama administration. (Notice that this despicable act never happened under Obama. And if you want an explanation for this, here's a helpful article: https://www.npr.org/2018/06/20/621489166/family-separation-is-trumps-immigration-policy-here-s-why-he-won-t-own-it) It's despicable that Attorney General Jeff Sessions would attempt to defend this despicable act by using - actually misusing - a religious text. Any way you slice it, the Christian scriptures do not support the kidnapping of children by a government. That said, let me tell you a few things that the same religious text actually does say. I don’t say these things to be preachy. I say them to show how heinous it is that this entire ordeal is happening, how heinous it is that Sessions is trying to use a scripture to defend it, and how heinous it is that the political party which people most often associate with Christianity is the political party which is perpetrating these horrific, anti-Christian, anti-American atrocities: But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself (Leviticus 19:34) For the poor shall never cease out of the land: therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land. (Deuteronomy 15:11) I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not. Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee? Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. (Matthew 25:42-45) But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 19:14. One note: in this passage, by "Suffer" it means "Allow" - just in case that's not clear.)
These are just a few of the things that the Christian scriptures actually DO say. It's despicable that anyone would try to tell us otherwise in order to support a despicable political agenda, one which involves our government literally kidnapping children. I've never been so ashamed to be a U.S. citizen. I've never been so ashamed to have even loose associations with Christianity. Wake up, America. You're better than this. At least, you can be. And especially wake up, all you so-called "Christians" who support these despicable acts. You don't worship YHWH. You worship a plot of land.

Godless

I saw a homeless person on my way to the hospital, and another on my way back.

On my way to the hospital, there was a man on the side of the road, in his mid-to-late twenties—my age, in other words, more or less—holding a tiny cardboard sign that was too small to read from the center lane. He was smiling, and almost had a slight spring in his step.

On my way from the hospital, there was a girl. She was in her early twenties at the oldest, and had much less positivity in her demeanor. It was about 8:30 at night; she was standing in the small halo cast by a streetlight. Her cardboard sign was larger, more legible. It read:

Young

mother

godless

This struck me as a very peculiar statement for a homeless person to make while asking for help. A hundred or more thoughts ran through my mind about her story, her situation, about what her motivation could be for deciding to write this bold, uncanny statement.

Was she saying that she had given up hope? That she didn't know what to believe in? That, if there is a god, surely he wouldn't have allowed her to come down so far?

Was she saying something about Christians? Has she been burned by Christians? Had they done this to her? Has her general experiences with Christians left her with the impression that she was more likely to receive help from people who do not identify themselves as Christians?

Or perhaps she wanted to distance herself from other homeless people, wanted everyone who passed by to know that she was different from the others. Maybe she simply wanted to be completely honest. Maybe she was trying to say, “You—whoever you are, whoever your god is—you could end up here too.”

It was not until I passed by, seeing her sign from a slightly different angle, that I noticed her hand had been covering the 'b'. In actuality, her sign read:

Young

mother

godbless

On the one hand, this clarified quite a bit. This was more standard. At least superficially, the one letter can make a world of difference; it gave her humble sign almost the opposite meaning. Most probably, none of those thoughts or questions would have crossed my mind if I had seen the 'b' from the beginning.

Then again, on the other hand, I wonder if this one letter still doesn't tell the whole story.

God or no god, was she giving up hope? What did she believe in? Had she ever imagined herself here?

God or no god, was she being honest? Did she sincerely wish God would bless everyone that passed her by, in all of the ways that she herself was not being blessed?

In the end, I'm not so certain how much the one letter mattered.

'B' or no 'b', she was a young, homeless mother in desperate need of help.

Incidentally, an experiment: in that last statement, replace the letter 'b' with the word 'god'.

'B' or no 'b', she was a young, homeless mother in desperate need of help.

God or no god, she was a young, homeless mother in desperate need of help.

The devil is in the details, they say. But then again, perhaps God is too.

Invisible Children

There is a war going on. Maybe you’ve heard of it. Maybe you haven’t.

And I don’t mean that in a clever way. I don’t mean a “war of words”; I don’t mean a disagreement between the left and the right, the old and the new. And I don’t mean the spiritual war that your pastor is always talking about, between the forces of good and evil, or the “powers that be.”

Actually, maybe I do mean a spiritual war. Because any way you look at it, something isn’t right here. Something that needs good people to stand up and do something about it.

But I also mean the kind of war that uses guns. Hate. Molotov Cocktails. Torture. Rape. Displaced children. Missing persons. Homes torn apart. Young boys forced to become soldiers in an army that is ironically, purposefully called the “Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).”

Young boys forced to slaughter their own families.

This is the war I’m talking about. This is the war that is happening in Africa right now, as you read this, as I write this.

If you haven’t heard of Invisible Children, you need to.

In short, they are the ones who are actively, restlessly, passionately working to undo this wounding, scratching, screaming, tear- and blood-soaked war. They are the ones who are calling the soldiers to lay down their guns and come home—telling these soldiers that the open arms of family and community are still here, that an education is possible, that peace can actually happen in this world, in their world.

And, if it helps, here are 85 reasons that Invisible Children does precisely what they do:

·         On August 4 of this year, a 16-year old boy defected from the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), ultimately arriving in safety in Nzako, Central African Republic (CAR).

·         On August 9, 13 women and children were released from the LRA.

·         The next day, 33 more women and children were released in Digba, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

·         On August 27, 12 men, women, and children escaped from the LRA in the Bili-Ango-Digba Triangle, DRC, during a reported clash between the LRA and Congolese security forces.

·         On September 2, 26 women and children were released from the LRA near Kiliwa, DRC.

This comes to an unprecedented 85 escapees/returnees from the LRA, in a matter of only 28 days. 

In 28 days, 85 men, women, and children got their lives back.

In 28 days, 85 men, women, and children got another chance at happiness and normality.

In 28 days, 85 men, women, and children got to take their hands and use them for peace instead of for destruction.

In 28 days, with our help—that is, with yours and mine and your friends’ and my friends’ and even the people we don’t know or like—imagine how many more reasons Invisible Children will have to keep up the fight, to undo the hurt, to show the wounded that they still have a home.

What have you accomplished in the last 28 days? More importantly, what can you accomplish in the next 28 days?

Invisible Children is—quite literally—changing the course of the world.

Invisible Children is—quite literally—introducing hope where there is none.

Who wouldn’t want to be a part of that?

the Universal Mime

“There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till.”

from Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson

When people are in grief or hardship, you often hear them ask things such as, “Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?”

But there is a rule which every culture of every age of the earth has weaved into its ethical framework, which, in practice, we find cannot be otherwise.

In Eastern religions and philosophies, it is called karma.

In Western culture, it can be summed up with a phrase from the Christian Bible; namely: “You reap what you sow.”

What I mean to say is: If you live your life built around clichés, you will get clichés in response.

If you are looking for a “light at the end of the tunnel,” then yes, you will find one. But most probably that is all you will find. You will not find the sun, but rather a flashlight, a flickering fluorescent bulb. There will always be artificial lights amidst—and at the end of—cliché tunnels, but never the sun or moon or stars or every manner of light which nature has provided for you already.

Clichés are not a comfort. They are an imitation of comfort, a distraction from reality. They are a black canvas strewn high over our heads with small holes poked through it: you think you are seeing the stars, but you are only seeing emptiness.

The universe always pays you back in kind.

You must ask—and answer for—yourself: What will be my payout?

If you seek mimicry, the universe will be a mime for you.

But if you seek truth and reality, then the universe will peel back its layers, slowly, one at a time, bit for bit, allowing you to see the clockwork behind it.

In this way, life heaps fewer surprises on us than we would have ourselves believe, and yet, more justice.

No, life does not always seem fair. But sometimes, when faced with adversity or—what seem on the surface to be—unfair situations, it is helpful to remember that how you respond to these times is another link in the infinite causal chain of universal reciprocity.

And it is helpful also to remember that society does not understand this or support this.

But the universe does not reward society with its fits and clichés; rather, it rewards individuals with their personal accomplishments and temperaments.

And, in time, it will reward you precisely as you have rewarded it.

If you want to be treated with kindness, be kind.

If you want to see beauty, make beauty.

If you want to be paid generously, give freely.

“These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs. Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.”

from Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Casen Buswell

“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors—

We borrow it from our children.”

~ Native American proverb

Normally, I think that people use this quote in the context of being more environmentally friendly and such. Maybe that’s exactly what the proverb is meant to resonate—who knows?

But I’m using it in a different context today—something a little more immediate and more intimate.

I’m normally not one for politics or preachiness or advertisements or anything else of the sort, but I just couldn’t pass this up. I came across this article on Yahoo! News a few days ago, and it REALLY got to me.

This is about a baby boy, Casen Buswell, who lives in Washington State and has an extremely rare disease, called glomuvenous malformations plaque type. You can read the article to get an idea of what this disease does—it sounds horrific. And it is so rare that Baby Casen is one of only 14 known cases in the entire world. Yes, you read that right: 14. Not 1400 or 14000 or any other amount of zeroes tacked on to the end of it.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13,

14—this one is Baby Casen

I’m not a doctor or a scientist. I don’t have any affiliation with the CDC or any medical facilities or organizations. But I’m wagering that having only 14 cases worldwide has got to make this one of the most rare diseases out there—if not the number one rarest. And, being so rare, there is only one facility in the world that treats this disease.

The problem is: it’s in Belgium.

And Baby Casen needs monthly treatments.

Baby Casen needs monthly treatments in Belgium.

The distance from Puyallup, Washington (where the Buswell family lives) to Brussels, Belgium (where the medical center that can treat Baby Casen is) is right about 5,000 miles.

The Buswell family is expecting this entire process to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. To help raise money, they’ve started a fund online that can be accessed here.

Let me make it clear that I’ve never met the Buswell family, and—pending some rather peculiar twist of fate—I’m sure I never will. But now that my son Emerson is born, seeing and hearing about other suffering babies hits me about 1,000 times worse than it ever has before. (Am I exaggerating?—maybe a little. But not as much as you’d think.). Emily (my wife) and I have been incredibly lucky the past few months with Emerson, and any time I hear about another baby who isn’t so lucky, it breaks my heart (even writing this is causing me to get all teary-eyed!).

Emily and I aren’t rich—ha! We already don’t particularly have quite enough money for our own needs. Regardless of this, we still pay tithe to our church (mostly for philosophical reasons, at least on my part). But I’m pretty sure our church could live without our little tithing check once or twice so that we can put that money towards helping Baby Casen. So that’s our plan.

To be clear: I’m not asking anyone to do anything about this except read the article. The Buswell’s goal for this fundraiser is to hit $50,000, and it’s closing November 30^th. As of the time I’m writing this post, they’ve raised $18,776 so far—not yet halfway there. Really, it’s nothing to me if you choose to contribute any money to the cause. It’s not my child; he’s nobody I know; it’s certainly not like I’m ever going to ask you if you donated anything. I’ll never know what anybody does with this information. I just wanted to make sure more people hear about him and his situation, so that—just maybe—the Buswell family can get just a little closer to saving their seven-month-old son.

I would ask you to do the same thing if Emerson was the fourteenth baby in the world with this disease. Just read the article, look at the pictures of Baby Casen (there are many on the fundraising website), and do what you will.

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors—we borrow it from our children.

We are borrowing the earth from Baby Casen and from my son Emerson.