Sunday, February 19, 2006

More of the same

Pakistani Capital Sealed Against Protests

The comcast article in question, by an AP writer is linked above
Help me make sense of this.

"Elsewhere in the Muslim world, demonstrators with wooden staves and stones tried unsuccessfully to storm the U.S. Embassy in Indonesia, while tens of thousands rallied in the Turkish city of Istanbul and complained about negative Western perceptions of Islam."

"Ethem Erkovan, a 47-year-old participant, who held a banner in one hand and his daughter in the other, accused Western nations of maligning Islam. ((Maligning Islam??!!))"They are the ones who are trying to depict the expanding Islamic community as terrorists, though all we want is peace," he said."

So......as they are busy attacking, burning, beating to DEATH and destroying, all over a cartoon of their prophet, we are at fault for their negative image? Huh? We have a negative image of them and we are the ones trying to depict them as terrorists. I think they are doing a great job of that themselves, yes?

"In Karachi, Pakistan's largest city, police said 15,000 coalition supporters, most wearing white shrouds of mourning splashed with red paint to symbolize their willingness to die defending the prophet's honor, rallied peacefully."

At least they weren't killing anyone to defend his honor. I think perhaps the muslim world would do much better defending the honor of their prophet by behaving honorably. Their behavior (in his name) is a much larger affront to the prophet's good name than any cartoon.

Saturday, February 18, 2006

Where we're at now

Well, it has been a busy and stressful time but I hope in the end it will all have been worth it. My daughter is now enrolled in a program through a local provider of mental health services to help her with her emotional issues. It is a kind of intensive day treatment program, which will give her the therapy she needs to get better, feel better, while still giving her the academic support she needs. I worryat times she will get too far behind, but then, she is already behind and not catching up. If we don't fix the emotional issues that keep her from succeeding, she will just stay behind anyway. It's like a marathon runner who has a broken foot, you have to fix the foot first before you train for the marathon, no matter how far behind that gets you from the other runners. Perhaps she will need to take mroe time than the average kid needs to get through school and into life. If she doesn, I guess she does, what are you going to do? I hope that there continues to be support for her as she transitions from school to college, in terms of emotional and educational support that she currently gets. I think if the federal government mandates special ed resources for elementay and secondary school but drops them on their butts in college they won't be doing them any favors. Oh well, that is a ways off and today has it's own troubles to be dealt with. We'll get family counseling as well as individual for her. We need it. I have to say that once the school began dealing with it they have done a great job, it just took a long time for them to deal with it, and I think that if we didn't push it, they wouldn't have dealt with it. We would have gone round the same merry go round as before. That's how we got here in the first place. She is better, less stressed, well, she isn;t relaly doing anything in school right now, things are on hold until she gets to her new program and academics willt ake a back seat to emotional helath for a while. I think that's ok, the kid has been bearing a load to heavy for her for too long anyway. I say let her get better, she has her whole life to grow up and learn. As it stands right now she doesn't really learn much, she is to stressed. I pray that she will not get involved in drugs,s o many kids do, as a way to self medicate, I watched my sister do that, it is ugly. I want her to get the tools that the rest of us take for granted, how to survive the world intact, and deal with each day without turning to chemicals to make it happen. God is by her side and she has the strenght, we just need to help her gain the skills. She is a fighter, but she is also sometimes a fragile kid. I lift her up and hold her tight and hope and pray that she will stand her ground against the world that tries so hard to beat her down, and realize that she is more than a conquerer, with God on her side. She feels she is all alone against the world and she tries to insulate herself against she she imagines to be the enemy and in the process she insulates herself against those that would help her and the very things that she needs. She is fighting battles that aren't there.

What a metaphor for how we all are in this world. The enemy's greatest tool is to wear us out fighting battles we don't have to because God already won them. We just have to stand in the victory Christ already has gotten. Yet we don't see it and so we don't believe it. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. We think it's our war. Our battle mainly, is to stand on what Christ has already done, against an enemy who is trying to make us believe that isn't true. We fight fear and darkness and lies with the truth. The truth is, God won, the battle is over, the victory is his, and ours. We enforce that with the enemy. It's not our victory, it's God. Praise God and Hallelujah!

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Olan Mills followup

To give credit where credit is due, they refunded the amount I paid, if not the fees they caused me. They sent the family portrait anyway, I'm not sure why, unless there just wasn't time t0 stop it. SO, thye made a good effort to make it right and I appreciate that.

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

Olan mills? No!

We just had a horrible experience with the Olan Mills company. On the 25th of January we had pics done at our church for a church directory. The pics were great, but we didn't have any money to purchase pictures right then, payday was not until the 10th of Feb. We told her that and said we would be happy to buy some later, but right now we couldn't. The lady selling the pics assured us 1)that we couldn't buy them later, if we didn't get today it would be much more expensive later (the pressure sell) and 2)that the check we wrote would not go through for several weeks as it had to go back east and wouldn't deposit earlier than our next payday. Based on that we said ok and went ahead and purchased the pics. You probably know the rest of the story. They slammed that check through so fast it would make your head spin. Five 27 dollar fees later, I am calling them pissed as all get out. All they can say is, so sorry, we'll refund you money but there is nothing we can do about the fees we caused you. It's all there on the paper you signed. Yeah but you lied to us, what crappy business ethics. Yes, well, sorry about that. SO we'll get the original money back but are stuck with the fees. BEWARE! This company will say whatever it takes to get you to buy, even if it means lying to you, so don't believe them, or better yet, don't use them. There are plenty of reputable businesses out there locally who will be happy to do the same thing with some accountability.

Welcome to the zoo

Danish mission in Beirut torched
These people are animals

They don't really think they will be able to join the rest of civilization until they learn a teensy bit of self control do they? The only thing going for them is, by and large, they also have third world weapons. However, a big bomb in their hands would be like giving a loaded gun to a baby, or worse, a hormonal teenager. That's why they are ensuring that we will have to attack Iran, no one on this planet can afford to let those nut cases to go nuclear. It would be bad. What idiots. Is this a muslim problem or just third world idiocy? Or are they the same thing?

Saturday, February 04, 2006

a week in review

Troy Polamalu, the Pittsburg Steelers safety, is a local boy, from a small town in southern Oregon. Sounds like a great young man, and a superb athelete. The Oregonian ran a story about him today, kind of a rags to riches story. They called him "highly evolved", what the f*** does that mean? I don't know and I doubt they do either. Never the less, I enjoy hearing about atheletes getting kudos for their character as well and their muscles. Yay Troy!

The muslims are pissed because the Danish posted a cartoon depicting the prophet Muhammed with a bomb for a turban. Maybe if they weren't so busy blowing people up.......
Anyway, the issue is their belief that it is blasphemy to make any image of the prophet. I thought blasphemy only applied to God. Doesn't that make their take on the prophet, only a man, in itself blasphemous? Let's see, Merriam Webster says......
Blasphemy-
1 a :The act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for God
b : the act of claiming the attributes of deity
2 : irreverence toward something considered sacred or inviolable

Ok, maybe if you took number three only and forgot about the rest. However, raising up a man who isn't god and never claimed to be god, and treating him like he is god seems pretty blasphemous in and of itself (see item b). If he is a man, then the whole "make no image" thing doesn't fly, unless you apply it to all men, that would mean that all their effigies are blasphemous, the ever present pictures of whomever the beloved leader of the day is, is blasphemous, and so on.

One might claim that we should respect their belief, and avoid offending them. So, where does it end? Should we veil our women so as not to offend? Should we institute Sharia law so as not to offend? Should we pray 5 times a day toward Mecca so as not to offend? I firmly believe that this is a matter between God and the danish editors. If he is offended, he will deal with them, not the muslim world. They should do what they believe to be right, and the Danish should do what they believe to be right. Let each be convinced in his own mind. Who made the muslims moral police of the world? If they posted a picture of Jesus, well so what? Even if we held the belief that was wrong, it would be their problem, Jesus isn't lessened by their faux pas.

So there.

Any other niggling little things I need to address.....no, not right now but I'll think of something.