Just when you think you have it bad...
Last night, following the outstanding "Daddy and Daughter Dance" with my beautiful daughter, Vicki and I watched "Frontline" on PBS. They had a feature on the sex trade in former Soviet states going into Turkey. It was difficult to take in. Pure evil was on display in the form of modern day slavery and total degradation of women.
When I watched this I wanted to help. Then I thought of Aids in Africa and other parts of the world. Then I thought of hunger, homelessness, genocide, terrorism, and all the senseless acts of violence. It seems as if the weight of pain and hurt and needs are pulling the world down... dragging it to its knees...
Where to start? What is my slice? I suppose the important thing in this is to do something...anything...and not to allow the size to intimidate me.
I give a nod to the one who stands in opposition to evil in the world:
"He came to Nazareth where he had been reared. As he always did on the Sabbath, he went to the meeting place. When he stood up to read, he was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,
"God's Spirit is on me;
he's chosen me to preach the Message of good news to
the poor,
Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and
recovery of sight to the blind,
To set the burdened and battered free,
to announce, "This is God's year to act!"
He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the assistant, and sat down. Every eye in the place was on him, intent. Then he started in, "You've just heard Scripture make history. It came true just now in this place."
Luke 4 (Message)
Living on a prayer,
sd
When I watched this I wanted to help. Then I thought of Aids in Africa and other parts of the world. Then I thought of hunger, homelessness, genocide, terrorism, and all the senseless acts of violence. It seems as if the weight of pain and hurt and needs are pulling the world down... dragging it to its knees...
Where to start? What is my slice? I suppose the important thing in this is to do something...anything...and not to allow the size to intimidate me.
I give a nod to the one who stands in opposition to evil in the world:
"He came to Nazareth where he had been reared. As he always did on the Sabbath, he went to the meeting place. When he stood up to read, he was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,
"God's Spirit is on me;
he's chosen me to preach the Message of good news to
the poor,
Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and
recovery of sight to the blind,
To set the burdened and battered free,
to announce, "This is God's year to act!"
He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the assistant, and sat down. Every eye in the place was on him, intent. Then he started in, "You've just heard Scripture make history. It came true just now in this place."
Luke 4 (Message)
Living on a prayer,
sd
Comments
I choose to believe the words of hope from the scroll reader's lips.
Frontline is the best news show/investigative reporting on television.
I'm sure you've heard the story of the boy who was walking along the sea shore throwing star fish back in after the tide, someone walks up and questions him "why are you doing this? it won't help, there are thousands laying here.
The boy replied, "it's helping the ones I'm throwing back in."
It's better to light a candle than curse the darkness....
I'm sorry. Sometimes I can't help myself... :-(
It is a sad world we live in, but I'm guessing it always has been. It's just that, now, so much of it is documented for everybody to see, and still it continues. I wonder why...
Perhaps, in part, it has something to do with all the fear of dying and the unknown. Nobody knows for sure, but so many think they do, and are scared to find out they might be wrong. So they destroy everything that disagrees with their view trying to make theirs the only way. You see if the mojority believe something is real then that something becomes reality.
Maybe, and here's a crazy idea, we should stop worrying so much about what happens after we die and start working towards a better here and now before we die. (That's what's going to help our kids and their kids the most.)
The endless struggle to secure an afterlife nirvana is energy wasted, in my humble opinion, and only benefits a selfish desire to live forever.
These are the words of the BigDog. :-)
http://bloodwatermission.com/
http://worldhope.org/worldhope/aboutnew.htm
I actually wrote a post similar to this on my blog: http://www.vinmark04.blogspot.com (since I see it was removed from your blog links. I got the boot! I hope it's because I'm getting too liberal. ;)
Thanks for the idea. Giddy up!
Liberal is a stupid word and so is conservative. I have no alternatives, but they have become dumb. Boy, I sound educated. :)
That show is 5 years ahead of it's time. But no one really watches it much because it's on PBS. Too bad.
PS - great to hear Kevin finally come out of the closet and admit he's a liberal. Don't worry, Kevin - you're on my links list and not going anywhere! :-)