The Necessity of Rest

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To remember

• time physically away = luxury
• sabbath in rhythmic rejuvenation sense = regular rhythms of rest > to make space one day a week
• Our society = a go-go-go society
• we work best when we take the time to rest
• choosing to rest one day a week = don’t keep pace with others who are willing to prioritize work over all else
• life = marathon
• no end > tasks to be done
• we are the ones to protect quality of our rest
• digital world cannibalizes time
• Freedom =/=  absence of restrictions as finding the right ones > those that fit with the realities of our own nature and those of the world

Grace Begets Beauty

“Now I know that the best thing I can offer this world is not my force, but a well-tended spirit, a wise and brave soul.”

Shauna Niequist, Present Over Perfect

The dust has just settled from some glorious time on a vacation away from my phone. It was the kind of magical family affair out in the forest, miles from town, without cell service. The kind where the windows are perpetually open to let in the mountain breeze, and there was not the same frenetic keeping track of others as we so often have in our perpetually connected society. If someone wanted to go out, they went out – to run, walk, fish, hammock, or otherwise. Or if they wanted to stay in, they read on the porch, played a board game, puttered in the kitchen, or took a nap. There was no checking in, no “where are you’s”, simply …

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Words losing their meaning

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When words lose their meaning, people lose their freedom.
~ Confucius

 

Doing vs. liking

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Doing what you love is freedom.
Loving what you do is happiness.
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From a polio stricken lady about wheelchairs and freedom

Terry Austin received his first wheelchair as a gift from the United States nonprofit organisation March of Dimes that works to improve the health of mothers and babies.

Growing up, going to church every Sunday was one of those never-miss activities for her family. She loved church because that’s where her friends would be. Her father was always her pastor.  Her father was a large man. He fought with the Marines in World War II and was wounded in the battle of Iwo Jima. He was the strongest man she ever knew, and she had a healthy fear, whether he was around or not.

When she was so young that the doctors had no conscience memory in her adult brain, she saw so many. Her earliest memories were of Dr. Matchett, an orthopedic surgeon who was assigned the task of helping her regain what she had lost to polio. She says

I remember him because of his gruff bedside manner. His training included treating wounded soldiers on the European battlefield during the war. {Prescription for the Church}

She dreaded visits to Dr. Matchett because he scared her.

His grey hair was perfectly coifed into a one-inch flat top, and he barked out orders to his nurse as if he were still a Colonel in the Army. Every time he saw me, he would grab my crooked foot, twist it straight, and say to my mom,

“This is the way it should look, and when he’s old enough, I’m going to fix it.”

It was painful; I hated it. When I turned 17, he did what he promised and fixed both of my feet, and made it possible for me to wear normal shoes. Prescription for the Church

Several years later she recognises

As painful as it was visiting Dr. Matchett if it were not for him repairing my feet and other stuff he did with my spine, I wouldn’t be here today. He knew what was needed for me to live to old age. The gruff doctor had a special place in our family, and we learned that when he said something was needed, we should listen. Years later, when he died, my mother sent his obituary to me, and I’ll admit, I grieved. Prescription for the Church

It was a few days before she started first grade in the small town of Eads in southeastern Colorado that she received her first wheelchair. Up until that time, the only way she could move around was to crawl on the floor or have someone carry her. Even having a wheelchair, she did not experience complete mobility. Stairs were always a problem, and her polio-weakened arms didn’t allow her to get too far away or traverse difficult terrain.

She writes

Things improved some when I was eleven and began walking on crutches. I continued to use a wheelchair for school and other times that required walking long distances, but now freedom was greater. Whenever Sharon would drag me shopping, I often waited in the car, which could be a long wait. When we went to the mall, I would typically walk in and find a central location where I could watch other folks shopping. {How to Live Free}

For her freedom came in the form of an electric wheelchair.

For the first time in my life, I was free to go places without help, without stopping to rest, and without worrying about a fall. Freedom is great. I didn’t especially enjoy shopping, but I did enjoy following Sharon up and down the store aisles and wandering around the mall. Conference Centers and parks were now a part of my world. Freedom is a great thing. {How to Live Free}

Read more: > How to Live Free

In that article she directs our attention to what we call the “Ten Commandments” within the context of freedom. She agrees that it seems strange to associate freedom with what we have always understood are binding rules. She writes:

Every preacher, worth his weight in communion wafers, has preached a series of sermons on keeping God’s commandments with a heavy emphasis on obedience. Obeying them certainly brings blessings, but they are still rules.

But let’s rethink this for a moment. The Israelites had been enslaved people for ten generations. They knew how to live according to rules imposed on them by a master. The last thing that would have interested them was more rules.

…

Jesus specifically did not come to “abolish” what they considered the law. He was there to “fulfill” or complete it. In other words, to bring it to complete fulfillment. Listen to what He said. Free people don’t murder because they have no need to be angry. Free people don’t commit adultery because they’re free from the lust after another man’s wife. Free people have no need to lie because the truth is enough. Free people don’t need revenge because God has given them everything they need.

When we are free from stuff, we are free from greed, anger, covetousness, and all the other emotions that separate us from others. We like to tell people that God is all we need, yet we live as if we are enslaved to other stuff. It’s inconsistent to say God has set me free, but it really makes me angry when you disagree with me, or I’m jealous of what you have, etc. We find ourselves living like the Israelites after leaving Egypt, wishing for what we left behind. {How to Live Free}

Gender, genderless, androgyny, bisexuality, cisgender and transgender

How many children between 10 and 14 are not going through a phase where they wonder who or what they are?

Photo by SLAYTINA on Pexels.com

In some countries, such as Belgium among others, there is a view that there are not two genders but that genderless people should be taken into account, i.e. people who feel neither male nor female and often have no need for a person ‘of the opposite sex’. In Belgium, they are given the designation X under their gender. The genderless, a grammatical category, often designated as male, female, or neuter, used in the classification of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and, in some languages, verbs that may be arbitrary or based on characteristics such as sex or animacy and that determines agreement with or selection of modifiers, referents, or grammatical forms.

Photo by Magda Ehlers on Pexels.com

In other countries, such as the United States of America, then, people who feel genderless or feel that they are in a body of another gender are more likely to be regarded as “devilish” and are taunted and humiliated, as well as dismissed as perverts. For many citizens over there it is normal that the man should have the highest position and that the woman should be considered the lower one, and coloured people the lowest. Equality is out of the question, whilst in other countries, it is not the priority at the moment. Worse is it when there are people who admit they feel attracted to both sexes, male and female. From searching by whom they feel most at ease, some enjoy their being with both genders and enjoying sex with as well as male as female persons. such persons are often between two camps; for one group they are cowards, not gay enough, unfaithful, untrustworthy, indecisive, and confused, for others, they are doing it for attention, or just for sex and their own selfish physical satisfaction. In some cases it is also part of the experimenting, looking for their own particular favourite, on the way to gay or on the way to find out that they are sitting in a wrong appearance male or female body. For lots of people, their wondering and feelings, being afraid of what others would say, make them suppress their sexuality and their true inner feelings. For most Americans, it seems that only the “normal” (heterosexual) kind is valid, making it very difficult for those who feel differently, to express their feeling or to accept what they really are.

In the USA, there is a very dangerous development going on at the moment, with a certain grassroots group wishing to have all kinds of books removed from libraries and schools. Books for children and young adults containing themes of race, gender and sexual identity received an “unprecedented” number of challenges last year, the American Library Association (ALA) has said, reflecting a growing national trend of attempted censorship. The challenges came from conservative parent groups and others. In some cases, the group says, librarians and elected officials were threatened with violence by members of the Proud Boys and armed activists at school board and library board meetings. In April, Pen America, a non-profit organisation that works to protect freedom of expression in the US, reported that 1,586 bans were implemented in 86 school districts across 26 states in the nine months to the end of March. The challenges reported to ALA in 2021, it said, represented the highest number of attempted book bans since the list began more than 20 years ago.

Already two years ago Republican state Rep. Tony Randolph introduced a bill that would outlaw marriage equality, permanently legalise conversion therapy, ban changes to legal gender markers, and block the passage of LGBTQ nondiscrimination protections.

In February 2020 House Bill 1215 (prohibit the state from endorsing or enforcing certain policies regarding domestic relations) was the third in a trio of anti-LGBTQ bills brought to the state’s legislature, the House passed a bill that criminalised trans-affirming medical care for minors. The other, Senate Bill 88, would require mental health providers to out kids expressing gender dysphoria to their parents. Anti-LGBTQ lawmakers and organisers use the state as a test case for the nation, experts say.

Kara Ingelhart, a staff attorney at Lambda Legal, characterises HB 1215 in particular as one of the most comprehensive bills to date targeting LGBTQ people.

Such laws and attacks from thought-limiting groups are also happening also more in some countries of Eastern Europe, where one can see that people’s freedoms and rights are gradually becoming more and more restricted.

“We don’t allow children’s parents to decide whether or not they can drink underage, whether they can smoke underage, whether they marry underage, and we certainly should not allow a child to be disfigured in a horrible way, in an irreversible procedure before they’re 18 years of age,”

Rep. Williams Lamberth, R-Portland, said.

The Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) said they require parental consent to treat minors who are being seen for issues to those receiving gender-affirming care and never refuse parental involvement for those under 18. VUMC officials said they began their Transgender Health Clinic because

“transgender individuals are a high-risk population for mental and physical health issues and have been consistently underserved by the U.S. health system.”

“We have been and will continue to be committed to providing family-centered care to all adolescents in compliance with state law and in line with professional practice standards and guidance established by medical specialty societies,”

officials said in the statement.

In some countries, people go so far as to consider it plausible that those who dress or behave differently from their physical appearance may be freely harassed, humiliated in words but also in deeds, even raped.

Photo by Alexander Grey on Pexels.com

Countries already immersed in a civil — rather, uncivil —war between two distinct political ideologies, the last five years seem to have come into a #MeToo rage and starting another uncivil war between the two genders.

During childhood, it often happens that parents want to steer their children into certain role patterns that are traditionally constructed. The search for “being” and dealing with attraction towards others, be they persons of the opposite or same sex, is part of growing up and belongs to peculiarities of puberty and adolescence that most young people have to go through.

During the search for one’s own personality and sexual identity, it does happen more than once that a conflict situation arises between parents and child because the parent cannot enter the child’s own emotional world and feels hurt or feels a sense of failure because the child chooses a different sex than the parent has in mind.

In September of this year Tennessee lawmakers made their way into the discourse about providing gender-affirming care. Matt Walsh — a Daily Wire conservative commentator, who questions LGBTQ rights — said he considered the care to be that of castration and mutilation to minors and adults.

According NHS England most children who believe that they are transgender are just going through a “phase”, and therefore  it has announced plans for tightening controls on the treatment of under 18s questioning their gender, including a ban on prescribing puberty blockers, outside of strict clinical trials. The last few years in the states as well as in England we could see more clinics where such puberty inhibitors or hormone blockers, medicines used to postpone puberty in children.

Several campaign groups in Britain, receiving taxpayers’ money have told teachers to drop all gendered toilets and language – and not to tell parents if they change their child’s identity.

The Cass Review, commissioned by NHS England, has found

“there is a disproportionate number of children on the spectrum, in care, same-sex attracted or with trauma in their background who identify as trans.”

Victoria Atkins, who has responsibility for the Government’s gender equality policy, expressed concern that a rising number of teenagers were seeking “life-changing” medical interventions. Young people were undergoing treatment to change their gender because they regard it as

“an answer to questions they are not asking themselves”,

the minister said.

“It may simply be a case of greater awareness, it may be that for some they see it as an answer to questions they are perhaps not asking themselves. We need to be particularly alert to this with regard to young people. The treatments are so serious and life-changing, I’m a little cautious of the use of those treatments because of the potential for the rest of their lives.

“Lots of questions are rightly being asked about how we treat young people, people whose bodies perhaps haven’t developed yet.”

The NHS  services note that there is a need to change the services because there is currently

“scarce and inconclusive evidence to support clinical decision-making”.

NHS England says that the interim Cass Report has advised that even social transition, such as changing a young person’s name and pronouns or the way that they dress, is not a “neutral act” that could have “significant effects” in terms of “psychological functioning”.

Parent groups and professionals have long raised concerns that NHS medics have taken an “affirmative” approach to treating children, including using their preferred names and pronouns.

The proposals say that the new clinical approach will for younger children

“reflect evidence that in most cases gender incongruence does not persist into adolescence” and doctors should be mindful this might be a “transient phase”.

Instead of encouraging transition, medics should take “a watchful approach” to see how a young person’s conditions develop, the plans state.

When a prepubescent child has already socially transitioned,

“the clinical approach has to be mindful of the risks of an inappropriate gender transition and the difficulties that the child may experience in returning to the original gender role upon entering puberty if the gender incongruence does not persist”.

In March 2022 there were 5,500 children on an NHS waiting list for gender swap treatment at the Tavistock and Portman Trust’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) in London, after a “surge in demand”.

In 2010/11 this were only 138 children and in 2020/21 a 17-fold increase could be noted, that number had grown to 2,383 children.

Could the surge in demand for help and treatment possibly be linked to a global pandemic and the three lockdowns that left vulnerable youngsters imprisoned, isolated and glued to their screens?

By January 2021, a report compiled by the Care Quality Commission showed that the waiting list had already reached 4,600. In March, Stephanie Davies-Arai, founder of campaign group Transgender Trend, explained that during those lockdowns,

“life stopped, really – so adolescents at that stage in their lives, where they’re really searching for their identity, turn online”.

Photo by Alexander Grey on Pexels.com

The public consultation documents say that change is necessary against a backdrop of a sharp rise in referrals to the gender identity service, from just under 250 in 2011-12 to over 5,000 last year.

In recent years there has also been a spike, with

“the number of referrals currently at 8.7 per 100,000 population per year in 2021-22 compared to four per 100,000 in 2020-21 and 4.5 per 100,000 in 2019-20”.

On the day that Tom Daley marched into the Commonwealth Games with a pride flag bearing trans colours, the health service announced in July that it would be closing the Tavistock and replacing it with two regional centres based in specialist children’s hospitals.

Trans-ideology according to some is the inevitable culmination of left-wingers deconstructing gender and sexuality in the 1960s cultural revolution. Several conservatives are asking for a serious look at the consequences of the previous era of free expression of opinion and free sex.

Gay activists discredited the notion of aberrant sexual activity. Feminists said gender was a construct and a prison. This coincided with a new take on children, insisting they weren’t miniature versions of their parents but autonomous human beings who should control their own destiny, even their education.

The move is aimed at taking a more “holistic” approach to treating children and looking at the reasons why they are questioning their gender.

It is expected that the regional centres will be operating by the spring, whilst long-term plans for the gender identity services for under 18s, based on the final recommendation of the Cass review, will come into effect in 2023-24.

Rather than being delivered by therapists and hormone specialists, the new clinical teams will include experts “in paediatric medicine, autism, neurodisability and mental health”.

The proposals note that a “significant proportion of children” who are referred for treatment have neuro-development issues or family of social problems.

The new treatment teams will be led by a medical doctor and the service will only take referrals from GPs and other NHS professionals.

NHS England will also “strongly discourage” young people from buying hormones from private clinicians and will not accept clinical responsibility for the treatment of those who have done so.

Is one prepared to bear the consequences that children with yet serious questions regarding their identities and gender have to resolve, and how?

How exactly does the NHS plan to clear up the mess and plan for the fallout of mental health issues that will emerge?

The consultation on the plans closes in December.

It is the task of the adults to help children to accept themselves as they are and to get them to feel happy in their own bodies, even when it is not fitting in the general traditional idea of the mainstream. Parents and health workers should not teach them that mutilating their genitals and living inside a skin costume of the opposite sex is the way to peace and contentment, because studies have shown this is not the case. A life lived in medicalised pretence is not a happy or healthy one.

But we should be open to helping those who have come into adult age, and even when for some that may look late, when they are in their twenties and then changing, there are still many years to come to live in a ‘renewed body’.

Let’s hope the tide is turning, for the sake of our children.

 

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Preceding

A Progressive Call to Arms

Added commentary to the posting A Progressive Call to Arms

Times of overcorrections

Who Am I That I Could Hinder God?

Do the concepts of male and female need to have a formal official definition

The Catholic synod on the family and abortion

Looking at an American nightmare

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Additional reading

1. What’s church for, anyway?
2. Anti-Semitic incidents in Australia in 2012 highest ever on record
3. Human relations 2013
4. Study says highlighting gender leads to stereotypes
5. 2014 Culture
6. Same sex realtionships and Open attitude mirroring Jesus (Our View) = Same sex relationships and Open attitude mirroring Jesus (Some View on the world)
7. Tony Campolo Calls for Full Inclusion of LGBT Into the Church
8. Two synods and life in the church community
9. 2015 Human rights
10. Cincinnati outlaws quoting the Bible
11. In Eastern Europe the Foundations of the European Union in danger
12. Right-wing fundamentalist Christians to dictate the U.S.A.
13. Rights of Polish people in danger
14. Living in this world and viewing it
15. Problems with church counseling for gay people
16. A selection of The Telegraph articles for Sunday 2022 October 23
17. The Telegraph Front Page for Monday 24 October 2022
18. Oppressive language of anti-Jehovah people does more than represent violence
19. Intermarriage and Protecting the state of the Jewish and/or Jeshuaist family
20. Belonging to or being judged by
21. Need to Embrace People Where They Are

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Related

1. The Celebration Will Not Be Televised
2. Stonewall Was Not Televised (a “missing” post)
3. FTWMI: Introducing….You
4. The Impossible Cornerstones of Liberty
5. FTWMI: Re-Introducing Sophie
6. We’re All Going to Die: Doctors
7. Shocking News from the White House!!!: EU, transgender peoples, bathrooms and disagreements.
8. Transphobia: a debate that is perhaps wisest to sit out.
9. Imprecise pronouns
10. Oh, come on, or: Srsly?
11. Gender-neutral, or: Girly
12. America’s (Two) Social Commandments
13. The Tail Of A Winner: A Ten Commandments’ Tale
14. The Conversation Starter: A Ten Commandments’ Tale
15. Woke-nochio: A Ten Commandments’ Tale
16. How The Australian has run a Holy War on transgender youth
17. Let them serve: Defence drops ban on transgender soldiers
18. Unprecedented South Dakota Bill Aims to Erase LGBTQ People From Public Life Entirely
19. When is the right time to reveal your gender identity?
20. A trans woman has been found beaten and strangled to death in her own home
21. Sediments – London Film Festival
22. Digital Inclusion (Transgender)
23. Modern Feminist Classics: “Sexist History at the Heart of the ‘Science’ on Transsexualism” by Dr. Em (Parts I and II)
24. ”Gender dysphoria and being trans” – A scientific explanation
25. Me And The Trans Community
26. Born in the Wrong Body
27. Self-Care Sunday: Learning to Accept & Embrace Who YOU Are Amid Familial & Social Obligations, & Why it’s so Bloody Important!
28. Androgyny
29. Non-binary genders
30. On bisexuality
31. College students are increasingly identifying in ways other than’she’ and ‘he.’
32. Queer: A Graphic History – Meg-John Barker and Julia Scheele
33. Ask The Passengers, and coming out
34. Street harassment, and silence
35. No room for “gender fatigue”!
36. Boss Lady
37. Intro to sociology as cartoon
38. What we need to know as a #society as a #whole
39. Development projects: Urban research, informal settlements, migration, displacement, gender and the climate crisis
40. Kim Hye-soo Hyunta, son Yoo Seon-ho’s gender identity to change (Shrup) : Sports Dong-a
41. Equality
42. Mood 21: masculinity & self-care
43. A Peek into the #MeToo Purgatory Chamber
44. There Are No Cisgender Gods
45. The Hulk and Gender
46. Nashville: Thousands rally near State Capitol to end medical care for transgender kids
47. Is It Men Behaving Badly or Is It Us? Help-Hiding in Men
48. Nashville: Thousands rally near State Capitol to end medical care for transgender kids
49. I Just Want to Understand the Other Boys
50. US libraries face ‘unprecedented’ efforts to ban books on race and gender themes
51. Fig Leaf
52. Biblical Sexuality and Gender Bibliography
53. Biblical Sexuality and Gender, Part Two 1 Peter 3:16-17
54. What Would You Do if Your Dad Came Out to You?
55. Coming Out of “Love, Simon” with Gratitude
56. YOBcast 097: Scripture Stories, Part 2
57. YOBcast 098: Side B Resources, Part 1
58. Gay and Disabled – Just Like Me
59. Am I Actually in Touch with My Feelings as a Gay Man?
60. The First Relationship I Didn’t Know I Wanted
61. Wedding dreamers
62. Free the nipples
63. Women lost their jobs
64. Boys and dolls
65. The old witches
66. When I met The Ladyboys Of Bangkok…
67. Gender-Grusel und Werkzeug (2)
68. Exespía trans denunció que fue detenida en Moscú por llevar bandera de EEUU en su mochila
69. Mulher transexual tem direito a cirurgia plástica mamária feita pelo SUS
70. La verdad sobre el supuesto trío de Fernando Carrillo con una modelo transexual
71. Asesinaron a Alejandra Ironici, la primera mujer trans que cambió su género en el DNI sin ir a la Justicia
72. La insólita historia del transexual que denunció a un ginecólogo porque no lo atendió
73. Revictimización, discriminación e indiferencia: la realidad de las personas trans en Latinoamérica

Freedom for whom?

 

East of Eden

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to drag on, one thing is emminently clear to politicians, scientisits, business leaders and the public at large: mass vaccination is the only way out of the pandemic, and thus the only way out of the cycle of restrictions that have been imposed on our lives. Most people can see this, and thus most people in Britain have already gotten vaccinated at this point. But of course, not every country is as fortunate to have vaccination rates as high as ours.

In Austria, which has among the lowest vaccination rates in Europe at 42%, has recently become the first country in Europe to make it mandatory for all eligible citizens to recieve the Covid vaccine. In the US, only about 59% of the population has been vaccinated, which sounds fine until you remember that a large and vocal part of the population resists the idea…

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Freedom is unthinkable without responsibility

“Freedom is unthinkable without responsibility.
Personal freedom finds its limit in the freedom of one’s neighbour.
Responsible action is needed to protect our fellow human beings in this pandemic.
According to scientific findings, vaccination is an effective means of combating the Corona pandemic. We see it as an obligation to be vaccinated, provided there are no medical reasons against it,” emphasises Diocesan Council Rottenburg-Stuttgart spokesman Dr Johannes Warmbrunn.

Original: Freiheit ist ohne Verantwortung undenkbar

3 Things Black People Wish White People Understood

In Europe we regularly see some films and news clips that portray American culture, giving us the impression that there is still a big problem with the attitude of white Americans opposite black people.

The Writer Erin a writer on Tarot, Soul, Spirituality, Culture, and Mytho-tainment, believes that

Living in America is a very interesting conundrum. On one hand, it is a free country, the land of opportunity, and a melting pot of cultures and perspectives.

We may have the idea that it is a free country, but see that it is not so free for many coloured people, and that lots of Americans think their own individual freedom goes above the freedom of others.
The article writer admits also that the U.S.A. is often a painful place for people of colour. She writes

For black people in particular, it’s a place where our ancestors traumas have carried over into our present.

We agree that here in blue Smurf country (Belgium) by football- or soccer fans we also do find a lot of racists, though lots of soccer players over here are dark-skinned. More than once they get banana peels and awful language thrown at them. But in the U.S.A. it seems to go much further:

Systemic racism, like inequalities in housing, banking, education, and healthcare are serious aspects of our trauma.

says the American coloured writer. She continues

But another, that we don’t think is quite understood enough, is our experience with not being heard and with having our pain disregarded by people who are simply too uncomfortable to listen.

In many countries that is a big problem, that the majority does not want to know and does not listen to sounds which should alarm them, indicating that there is racism around them.

We disagree with Secrets of HIV-Aids Journal where Secretsofaidsebolafacts writes

Belgium and American journalists for decades have the delight to support the lies, deceptions, and crimes of their governments, politically and medically, but now they are finding it uncomfortable because an African journalist is in their mist exposing their crimes. {Belgium and America have something in common, the killing and disfiguring of black people}

Already many decades, several Flemish writers in Belgium talked about bad conditions for African people in Belgium as well as in the colonies. After World War II we regularly got to read stories of what had happened in the previous centuries by certain people who used the colonies for their own financial gain at the human cost. That writer of the article says he is already living in Belgium for twenty years and want his readers to believe that

no one hears of a killing of a black man, doesn’t mean that everything is normal in the country.

His idea of black people to

wake up each morning to see statues and streets named after the lunatic King Leopold II, whose relatives, the royal family, together with the Belgian government feel comfortable about it.

gives a distorted view of how black people manage to cope or have difficulties with the previous history of colonisation, which for sure is not such a good one, but it is ridiculous to do away with that history. Denying what happened in the past, taking away all the statues of the previous colonisers would fade away that important part of Belgium history. It would be the same bad thing if we would take away the statues of all historical figures who did something wrong, and as such would have all the street nameplates that remind us of Napoleon, Ferdinand Foch, Pinochet, Marshal Bugeaud, Bertrand Clauzel, Reagan, Nixon, Adolfo Calero, Arturo Cruz and Alfonso Robelo, and other human rights violators, Spanish and Austrian king, princes and rulers.

According to history, the Nazi leader, Adolf Hitler, killed over 6 million Jews. The shame Hitler brought to Germany, forced the country’s leaders to change the name of the streets after him, moreover, everything relating to Hilter was banned.

writes Secretsofaidsebolafacts who continues denying the fact that in the last 2 decades many street names in Belgium, have been changed because the officials no longer considered it appropriate to display the name of a controversial figure on street signs or in public squares.

Belgian National Leopold II monument in Brussels

That is not the case in Belgium, a country that planned to destroy Congo and the people for losing its colony. The Belgian government and the royal family are happy that the big statue of Leopold II riding on a horse is not easy for demonstrators to pull down but they will pull it down, unfortunately, that time will be too late.

Belgian Congo, former colony (coextensive with the present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo) in Africa, ruled by Belgium from 1908 until 1960.

He also goes a bridge too far in claiming that Belgium’s aim was to destroy Congo. That was not the case at all. Several police and business leaders may not have been shy about exploiting the local population, but on the other hand there were many more people who really wanted to make a positive contribution, albeit sometimes with a wrongly coloured vision, and who did a wonderful job without humiliating or abusing the coloured people.

In the article of The Writer Erin, is expressed the hope to summarize 3 things that black people wishes white people understood.

If well meaning white people wonder why

“we can’t just all come together and get along”,

the writer does hope that her article may be a great place to start. She writes

And truthfully, most black people are angered when faced with these issues because we think white people should understand this innately.

However, everyone hasn’t walked in our shoes and everyone doesn’t understand the world from our point of view.

Don’t get me wrong, I am aware that all black people don’t share these views. All black Americans aren’t ancestors of slaves. And all blacks haven’t been culturalized in our communities.

But I can say that there are general overarching beliefs and themes and for the most part, these feelings and beliefs are patterns in the black American psyche.

Please continue reading the articles:

1. 3 Things Black People Wish White People Understood
2. Belgium and America have something in common, the killing and disfiguring of black people

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Preceding

From Guestwriters 2016 in review

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Additional reading

1. Martin Luther King’s Dream Today (Our world) = Martin Luther King’s Dream Today (Some view on the world)
2. Arson attack carried out on Stevenage Central Mosque (Our world) = Arson attack carried out on Stevenage Central Mosque (Some view on the world)
3. Speciesism and racism (Our world) = Speciesism and racism (Some view on the world)
4. Rome mobilisation to say no to fascism and racism (Our world) = Rome mobilisation to say no to fascism and racism (Some view on the world)
5. Apartheid or Apartness #2 Up to 2nd part 20th Century
6. Trump going over the top bringing a blasphemous act (Our world) = Trump going over the top bringing a blasphemous act
7. Don’t Envy the World (Our world) = Don’t Envy the World (Some view on the world)
8. Actions to be a reflection of openness of heart (Our world) = Actions to be a reflection of openness of heart (Some view on the world)
9. “Black lives matter!” a statement of proclamation (Our world) = “Black lives matter!” a statement of proclamation (Some view on the world)

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Related

1. Belgium and America have something in common, the killing and disfiguring of black people
2. Police departments struggling to hire, especially minorities
3. Stop Saying We Need More Black Doctors, Lawyers, etc.!
4. The Apartheid killers of South Africa
5. Black people are dying more than any other people on this planet – Wangari Maathai
6. Those Orleans girls are still racist (or STUPID at best)
7. A History of Jake Bird in North Omaha
8. The Average White Guy Game
9. Trolls or Smurfs… a tale of microaggressions and boundaries
10. Building Little Harlems Around the Globe
11. Numb to Racism – The Life of a Tennis Player
12. truth about White colonization in Africa / White woman Dropping Facts about African History & Racism
13. It is a scientific tautology to say black people are prone to pandemics
14. Arguing With Black People Over Black Culture

Your Life: Habit or Freedom?

 

VeritasCurat.net

For audio/video of this article, please visit the Veritas Curat YouTube Channel, or scroll to the bottom of this page.

A friend once asked me, “With all the years you’ve studied the mind and its functions, why have you not written a book? Especially since you love to write?”

I could have given him a dozen different answers, but what instantly issued from my mouth was, “You’re supposed to write what you know. All I’ve focused on has been stuff like truth and wisdom. I see no point in writing about it, since greater minds than mine have already said it before.”

Without missing a beat, my friend quipped, “That’s okay. People weren’t reading about truth and wisdom before either.”

Whether considering the Stoics, Buddhists, or any other countless philosophies or religions over the centuries, I’ve discovered two common themes.

First, have unconditional love for all of humanity.

And…

View original post 864 more words

Looking at an Utopism which has not ended

Marcus Ampe wrote a few days ago on WordPress “Utopism has not ended” giving more clarification on his way of thinking and about his “Utopian Dreams“. In  a series of articles on his WordPress blog he continues to look at reasons why we should not give up hope for a better world and how some Christians and certain people are too much afraid for matters of social protection.

The Thousand-Year View from N.S. Palmer wants to apply time-tested ideas to the problems of our modern era and also took a look at Mr. Ampe‘s writing. N.S. Palmer preaches that we shouldn’t worry about things we can’t control, but it’s easier to say than to do. On that point we seem to differ. We cannot escape being in this system and having to live in this world at a certain time. But how we live and what we are willing to accept to happen plays an important role in our life. When people, living in this world, believe it could be very well possible to make it a better place for many, to some that might be an unreachable goal, to others it should be something to work at.

Trying to get a perfect society is something which we all should be doing. Though we agree only partly with Mr. Palmer who says

No society ever has been or ever will be perfect. {Utopia’s Biggest Problem}

him forgetting that one day Jesus Christ shall return and install the Kingdom of God here on earth. The Nazarene rabbi his government will be the most perfect governing body and shall give all its inhabitants the most perfect system to live in.

Mr Palmer further finds that

utopians waste their time and cause great harm by rejecting possible goals and pursuing an impossible goal. {Utopia’s Biggest Problem}

It is true that the goal set by utopians might be very unreachable, hence their name “utopists”, or followers of utopian dreams, thinking of utopia (1500-1600) being the imaginary perfect country in the book Utopia (1516) by the English humanist and statesman, chancellor of England (1529–32) Sir Thomas More, from Greek ou “not, no” + topos “place”.

Because their goal can never be achieved, nothing will ever be enough. They think we should keep doing the same things, just do them harder. Spend more money. Take away more freedom. Police more speech. {Utopia’s Biggest Problem}

Such an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its citizens may be presented in several authors their stories. A utopia focuses on equality in such categories as economics, government and justice (a non-exhaustive list), and does not focus on “spending more money” like Mr. Palmer seems to give the impression. Neither do utopians want to take away the freedom of people. Just the opposite they want to secure that there is freedom on all sorts of levels: freedom of life, freedom of thought, freedom of expression, a.o. but most importantly also freedom of choice under the condition not to limit others. That utopians want to have more control on those freedoms and perhaps would want to see more control of having all people receiving the same liberties and same equalities, may demand a controlling apparatus or police, but does not have to mean we have to go to become a police-state or a state of repression. That is the wrong vision a lot of people who are against socialism, utopianism and communism want to send into the world.

There are many debates about what constitutes a utopia. Many who are against any social feeling, what they call part of the “left” consider utopians and their world or societies they want to build, “utopias” benign or dangerous. Concerning utopia fitting or not, or being essential to a Christian world lots of contradictory ideas go round. Many ask

Is the idea of utopianism essential to Christianity or heretical? What is the relationship between utopia and ideology?

One of the leading scholars in the field of utopian studies, Lyman Tower Sargent argues that utopia’s nature is inherently contradictory because societies are not homogeneous and have desires which conflict and therefore cannot simultaneously be satisfied. Sargent notes that some thinkers see a trajectory from utopia to totalitarianism, with violence an inevitable part of the mix, and we have the impression Mr. Palmer might do so also.

According to Sargent:

There are socialist, capitalist, monarchical, democratic, anarchist, ecological, feminist, patriarchal, egalitarian, hierarchical, racist, left-wing, right-wing, reformist, free love, nuclear family, extended family, gay, lesbian and many more utopias [ Naturism, Nude Christians, …] Utopianism, some argue, is essential for the improvement of the human condition. But if used wrongly, it becomes dangerous. Utopia has an inherent contradictory nature here.

And that describes very well the difficulty of that utopian world for which Mr. Ampe puts his hand in the fire. He as several other Christians believes in the purity man can come to reach, in which innocence is in the heart of that person, enabling people to walk freely in nature naked, without others having bad ideas. In such a free world naturism would for example never be a problem, because all people would abstain from wrong thinking and wrong acts. In an utopian world there is no place for sexual offensive acts to the public sense of decency. There being no place for obscenity by people keeping themselves to pure thought the same as the first people in the Garden of Eden had. It was only after they had done wrong and came to know good and evil that they became afraid of the other and wanted to protect themselves by covering their body. Such covering in an ideal world would not be necessary, the same as it was not a matter to cover oneself in the 1970ies and hippies could share their places freely with others without having to fear something to go wrong. Nakedness was no problem at that time, whilst now we see again a lot of shyness and fear of nudity among many young people as well as some elderly people.

We do agree many of the boom children tried to create a perfect society in the 1960–70ies but failed terribly. Though we are not ashamed that we tried to stimulate others to step on the wagon with us (dreamers). Many of our generation might have betrayed their ideas, but Mr. Ampe like several others, as a follower of the Nazarene Jeshua (Jesus Christ) believes the teachings of that rebbe are still worth going for.

Utopians just ask people to take the responsibility for others and to respect everybody and everybody around them. They would never stimulate capitalism, like N.S. Palmer gives the impression.

 

At the moment we can grow unto more tolerance by learning to agree to disagree, as well by not being afraid to dare to engage in thoughtful political discussions. Though at the moment we still face the difficulty that not everyone involved is really interested in finding out the truth. An other problem these days is also that lots of people do not realise that disagreement does not imply evil. On that fact Mr. Palmer seems to agree and writes:

Calm, rational debate helps them see the underlying assumptions, strengths, and weaknesses of each person’s viewpoint. That helps everyone understand the issues better. It also helps them understand each other better. Screaming, hysteria, and emotional theatrics do not. {Dialogue Is Not Harmful}

We believe the Bible offers a way to live together peaceful and gives us a nice picture in the Book of Isaiah, what that world can and shall be. We might be utopians or dreamers for many, but Mr. Ampe with his brethren and sisters in Christ do believe those prophesies are going to become true, and as such shall their utopian dream once become a reality, though it still may take some time.

Mr. Ampe also believes we can be united and should try to convince those who hate certain people, to have them to accept them as co-living citizens with the same rights as them. It is for mutual benefit and the common good that people must be rational enough to set aside their differences and come closer to each other with full respect for each other and for other cultures.

Big problem today to come to such an utopian world is the egocentric and egoistic attitude of the present population.

We believe the Bible gives enough directions to come to a better world already now in our lifetime, even before the return of Christ. We do not have to wait until the wars to expect or the Big Battle or Armageddon, before we shall come to think about that better world. Already today, in our lifetime, we can show others fundamental truths of life.

Some might think utopians want all to become “puppets” handled by someone in charge of everything. But that is a wrong thought about the world envisioned by us. We are against any dictatorial system. It is a world whereby people freely agree to follow certain ethics and moral laws. We also do not say everybody has to do the same thing in the same manner. In our ‘utopian world’, there is enough freedom to act freely. Already now we can try to come to agreements to live a certain way, and this without any force or violence.

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Find also to read:

1. Misleading world, stress, technique, superficiality, past, future and positivism
2. Subcutaneous power for humanity 2 1950-2010 Post war generations
3. Are people willing to take the responsibility for others
4. Baby Boomers reaching retirement age, Demographic trends and New blood from abroad
5. Lower and middle-class youth becoming tiny cogs in a larger whole that they cannot control
6. Intellectual servility a curse of mankind
7. the Bible – God’s guide for life #3 Fast food or staple diet
8. the Bible – God’s guide for life #4 Not to get the best from our diet– or from ourselves
9. Determine the drive
10. Trusting, Faith, Calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #4 Transitoriness #3 Rejoicing in the insistence
11. The Scensual World – Mission & Vision
12. Are Christianity and Capitalism Compatible?
13. Francis Fukuyama and ‘The End of History?’
14. The Upbringing of Ideas and the Extrapolation of Capitalism
15. Utopism has not ended
16. A famous individual by the name of Jesus of Nazareth

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Further related

1. Utopia! 
   Utopia basically means paradise. And, in these times of social, political and ecological upheaval, to dream of a utopian world in which these problems cease to exist is completely natural.
2. Utopia – Thomas More ****
3. Broaden the Narratives: Mistaken Orders<
4. Humanities Retribution
5. Anarchy, State and Utopia
6. Leon Trotzky
7. Globalism: a Letter
8. Money-Free World
9. Alternative Earth
10. The Citizen’s Convention on Climate: utopia or step towards change?
11. Utopia….State of bliss!
12. Technology, Utopia, and Horizon Zero Dawn
13. Are We There, Yet?
14. History Bends Toward Chaos
15. “How will i get a cappuccino in your political utopia?”
16. Why Common Sense Is So Uncommon
17. Nothing Learned
18. We Can Have Unity Without Unanimity
19. How to Get a Healthy Society
20. Rebecca Solnit on Hope
21. The Blank Slate of Outer Space
22. The Climate Crisis and the Need for Utopian Thinking
23. And The Greatest Of These…Is Love
24. An Ode Of Utopia

Window 190 – The door to our truth, can only be opened from within

A Window Of Wisdom

“When we are unable to face the truth of our own feelings, we will vent our emotional pain upon anyone that goes against what we are trying to control, due to the exhaustion of representing our self as the truth, we wish we could be.”

 True freedom can only be felt when we stop concealing our thoughts, desires, and beliefs, and stop pretending to be someone we are not, or pleasing others out of fear; for when our truth is spoken, our spirit emerges, and our fear becomes void, to which freedom of our true self takes flight.

~ WOW ~

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Words of Wisdom for the Day – Toil of slavery – Freedom not a gift

1 800th post on From Guestwriters

Modern Slavery

Too many people close their eyes for products which are so cheap they could not be produced under normal conditions. But there are also companies which do not mind to sell their products at a very high price, but had them made in cheap labour countries.

In this capitalist system there is too much slavery going on and not enough people reacting against it.
The capitalist system has made many working people into slaves of a company, and more and more workers have to work for less income, whilst a a minor group of happy few can make themselves very rich by (mis)using all those ‘poor folks’.

Lots of multi-billion dollar companies which make money from our hard work even do not have to pay taxes whilst the workers have to pay a lot of taxes and can only dream of having a better world.

*

To remember

Slavery =  practice or system of owning slaves” + evolved to be a part of social norms.

slavery to a job, slavery to society, female domestic slavery, child slavery, slavery to live, slavery to abide by law, slavery to family and many many more.

live in a society > merely puppets with strings

age of retirement in UK = 66 for women and men. By 2026 = 67 or more.

exploit > work to make others richer

YesRickyThings

So this is a series of blog post that I have been meaning to start for a while now. I will be uploading content about controversial topics from different ends of the spectrum. I am merely trying to express my thoughts on certain topics looking at things from all different angles. In this aspect I hope to create a discussion to see what people think. This goes along with my interest of psychology and trying to understand how different people think and what their cognitive processes are.

This post is about modern day slavery. I would like all readers to read this with an open mind and be open for discussion. First, we must define what is slavery. There are many definitions for it however I will be taking oxford dictionary as a base definition. Slavery is defined as “the practice or system of owning slaves”. Now, when you ask…

View original post 654 more words

It’s Time real lovers of God to Stand and Speak Out!

On one article we reblogged over here (and as such did not write it ourselves) and in which there were used popular words by youngsters, somebody felt offended. It looks like she could not feel any empathy with the generation we and the author of the original article were talking about and brought herself calling us stupid people, though missing the whole point of that article and the discussion around it.

Extended Coloured family from South Africa showing some spectrum of human skin colouration

In our world we see still too many people who want to differentiate between skin colour and race. They continue to demand that there would be called or named the differences between people who live at the same place, instead of accepting everybody who lives there for what he is and for how he looks like. They insist that people who live already for many generations in a certain country or area would still have a referral to that long ago place of origin as if that place of origin of so many generations ago brought a blemish on that person. It looks like many do want that lots of people keep running around with the stain of their past and long death ancestors.

Today we see again a movement going on to put on all people labels, like Moroco, Turkish,  Arabic, Berber, Afro-American, etc.. Though those people may already live here for the 3rd, 4th or even 5th generation. As we spoke about the trend the Dutch Press requesting not to use the word ‘blank’ (fair) but now to use ‘wit’ (white) opposite ‘zwart’ (black) instead of ‘kleurling (coloured). Whilst certain newspapers still shall continue words as ‘blank’ and ‘kleurling’ (coloured) not looking at the different skin colour as something negative. Clearly the colour of the skin has become again a point of discussion and we are back to the way of return and pre-Martin Luther King-times, or the time of racial segregation with Apartheid.

Iranian-Belgian human rights activist Darya Safai playtoy of the rightwing political parties trying to limit the freedom of expression and freedom of religion

Several politicians are doing their best to come back to such a time and many migrants are helping them without them having a proper knowledge of what is happening. As such we may find the Iranian dentist Darya Safai who is used as a plaything by the Flemish Nationalists and/or right-wing political parties. The Iranian-Belgian human rights activist grew up in the Islamic Republic of Iran after the revolution of 1979. We can clearly see how she got traumatised with her experiences in Iran. There she experienced at first hand how it was to live as an oppressed woman in a religious dictatorship. But now she thinks this would also be so in Belgium or the countries around us. She insist that parents would have no say on the religious education they want to give at home and want to prohibit any person in our country to wear religious symbols or to have traditional attire.  She finds the schools must prohibit any religious dress-code. By doing so she wants the freedom of religion, the freedom of expression and the freedom of clothing restricted. By doing so see also endangers our democratic freedom.

After she was temporarily released on bail, she decided to flee Iran together with husband via Turkey to Belgium.  Instead of seeing that we want to be a free country where everybody should be able to live next to each other she now wants to create an other Iran where she shall be on the side of the dictators or decision makers. Though she says she wants to fight against discrimination she tries to bring in discriminating  measures, having children nor their parents the right to choose their own religion and how they want to be religious.

In December 2016, Darya Safai was awarded the title ‘Women Of Peace’ by the Belgian Secretary of State for Equal Opportunities at the Belgian Senate, for her fight for women’s rights, though at that time it was already clear she had a more unpleasant agenda.

Last week when  a state school was ordered to let 11 young girls (age 12) to wear their hijab to school inspite their ban on all religious symbols Safai went into heavy reaction again helping to have a growing stir in the debate

because when a judge rules that specific people can ignore a rule that counts for everyone, it will cause more division.

It is true that now other Muslim, Sikh, Jewish parents can go to court and achieve the same override for their kid. On the other hand by Safai her actions to forbid head-covering we now have Sikh kids in Sint-Truiden (Haspengouw Hesbaye), who cannot go any more to a state- or to a Catholic school because they are not allowed in with their head covering. For them and for those who want to wear a head-covering the only solution is to go to a private school. Safai forgets that this would cost the parents a lot more and that such private schools of a certain religion endangers our society more, because than there is no control by the school directorate and then the way to indoctrination is totally free and would be unnoticed. We also could see what happened already in one of the Antwerp Jewish schools a few weeks ago. We must be very careful with an overprotection and giving the opportunity to have youngsters drifting away.

Safai seems to think the same rules count over here as in her birthplace. She argues that the choice to wear a headscarf is not made by girls themselves. By this she underestimate the strong will of many Belgian girls. She says

“It’s not a free choice, when I see six-year-old girls wearing headscarves, I really wonder how they could decide that for themselves-it’s imposed on you and you live with them.”

For Safai the girls their head-covering is indeed a symbol of oppression.

“Men do not wear headscarves, that’s the best proof,”

Orthodox Christian pilgrim

said Safai, to which Vanhecke replied

“With Jews, only the men wear a yarmulke, and that is not seen as a symbol of oppression,”

Safai also forgets or probably does not know that in West Europe all kids from the 1940ies to 1960ies have had to cover their head as girls and we as boys had to cover (like the girls also) our limbs. No bare arms or are knees where to be seen and women at to sit on the left side of the church.  It is all still clear in our head also, how our parents and when we went swimming in the sea we had to cover most of our body. (Later, as hippies we went against those restrictions and ran even naked in nature.) And now a few years later what had to happen then suddenly should not be allowed any more. She also does it as if the head-covering is only a Muslim matter, forgetting that still today many religious Christian groups prescribe head-covering for their members.

Roman Catholic nuns – Roman Catholic nuns singing in choir. – Smith2006

Throughout the centuries of Church history, women have worn head coverings during the meetings of the church – that is, when “praying or prophesying” take place. In Europe the wearing of fabric head coverings in worship was also universally the practice of Christian women until the twentieth century and in several Reformed churches, Baptists, Christadelphian, Brethren and various Mennonites it is still the custom for young and old. In the South of Europe we may find lots of nuns of the Roman Catholic churches with a covering of their heads, whilst many women in the South (like Spain and Italy) still often have the head covering by means of a headscarf. In Eastern Orthodox churches, all women still cover their heads. With the old believers this may only be a headscarf, with the other Eastern Orthodox it may also be a veil.

Vanhecke, with good reason, thinks girls are also oppressed if they are not allowed to wear the headscarf.

“A religion obliges the headscarf, a society forbids it, that is the same principle.”

“You interfere in a fundamental right of parents to make choices for their children,”

says Vanhecke.

That what Safai tries to avoid she helps to create. One should avoid that we get such private religious schools as only possibility for religious people to give their kids an education. When we would have such specific Jewish, Hindu and/or Islam schools we make it much easier to have them a specific religious education or indoctrination and creating a generation which would be less adapted in our culture than those who grow up together with all sorts of kids from different nationalities and different religions. Instead of integrating them in a multicultural society Safai shall help to create a divided society with lots of racism.

So needless to say this situation actually causes the very religious division that the ban on head-covering tries to avoid.

Mieke Vanhecke (CD & V), ex-top woman of Catholic education, pleaded in Terzake for the right to wear a headscarf at school. Darya Safai (N-VA) continues to see it as a symbol of oppression. Vanhecke argues that not only Muslims are victims of the headscarf debate.

“A ban on headgear not only affects Muslims,”

says Vanhecke.

“In Sint-Truiden there were never any problems, the Sikh boys came to school with a turban, because of the ban they no longer have access to our school.”

Safia is convinced that children and young women can not make up their own mind what to wear. For her children nor women who wear the hijab impossibly can do that of their own will and impossibly can be happy clothing themself that way. Many like her she see misogyny and are convinced that they must be under dictation of a male dictator or male bully. Often we hear voices like

‘Her husband must have forced her’

‘Poor girl, she may not dress like she wants’

Safia like many right wing people can only think of suppression, seeing men’s orders and their power over women. Others love to shout

‘Unveil yourself’,

‘Hide not yourself”

‘Let us see your beauty’

Why should they have such a need to see the beauty of that woman? Why can they not respect that woman like she wants to dress herself?

Those people thinking women or girls who like to wear a head scarf of hijab are pushed by their family, do forget that there are enough strong women in Belgium who can make up their mind themselves. They do not need their fathers or their male partner to dictate what they should wear but even less should they have others to dictate what they should wear or may not wear. That last bit is what Darya Safai and many Nationalists and Neo-Nazis love to do.

Lots of those who call themselves Christian but oppose the freedom of other lovers of God, do forget that by doing so they go in against the Law of God. Their strong actions against Muslims and Jews also clearly show that they do not bear Jesus his teachings of love in their heart. Lots of them also do not understand that wearing a covering on the head may represent an ordainment from God and a submitting to the Most High. There are enough places in Scriptures which talk about such covering and reasons why and when to do it.

Those who are an atheist or do not believe in the One True God should not try to put their law above the Laws of God nor should they urge all others to live like them and to dress like them.

Many also do forget the use of a head-covering can just mean those women liberated themselves from the world and its attitudes. For many believers in the One True God it can mean just empowerment, liberation and freedom. Too many underestimate the European female and think they would be like the women in the Middle East used as slaves by the male figures around them. But we can see strong women who have made up their own mind and by their own choice and by their own intentions they dare to show their faith to others and are not afraid to be mocked at or to be looked at as of ‘not of this world’. They do not want to be of this world but of the world of God. For them that is more important than being a slave of this world where every body assumes he or she is free when they can have sex with as many as they can or drink as much as they want to do all the funniest things one can think of.

Mrs. Safai does as if those girls, when they would wear a head dress, never would be able to integrate in our society or would never be able to get work. When they would not get work because they wear a head covering, does that not tell more about the party who does not want to give her work? And does that not show how certain people do not want others to integrate in our community?

By the way, lots of right wing people do as if those Muslim girls who want to cover their head are foreigners, but a lot are girls and ladies who were before ‘white Belgian citizens’ and even belonging to Catholic families.

That many people are so much afraid that there would be so many converts to Mohammedanism tells also a lot about the weakness of most members of that faith. Lots of Roman Catholics and Protestants even not knowing the Name of God and never having read the Bible. If they would be standing strong in the faith we see no reason why they and others should be so afraid. The other way, Christians should come out and proclaim their faith to those who are no Christian. They should show people that Jesus is the way and show that Jesus his teaching is one of love and of comprehension and compassion. But most Belgians, Dutch and French people just show the opposite, showing their hate against immigrants and people who are different than they or who think differently than they.

Lots of people seem to have forgotten how we and our parents had to cover our body a few decades ago. Lots of them also forget that just because their western values don’t fit with a woman covering her hair and beauty, it still could be a personal choice for that person covering herself. Many do forget that their Western values are way out from our Christian Western values and norms.

Today so many oppose people who have an other opinion. We also see the right wing people wanting so much that every body would dance to their will.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said,

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

These days we are going backwards because several people want to push their will unto others. They want an exclusive white state for themselves with only believers in that what they believe and in that what they call Christian values, but are not at all Christian values.

In Belgium we can find  more and more Muslim children in community education, especially with regard to other educational networks we may find a larger influx of students from other cultures in general in the state schools. When these children want to show their own faith in the form of clothing, they often do so out of their own convictions, but because these young people are not yet adults, they often take over the prevailing morality of their immediate environment and of society. If we compare this with the Flemish youths of indigenous origin, we notice a big difference, but according to us that is easy to explain. After all, with many Flemish young people there is a great ignorance of the church, while the Muslim children are more often socialized in their ideology.
The total banning of religious signs would thus be a violation of religious freedom. We should resist such a thing.
That a lot of inhabitants of Belgium, Holland and France do not want to stand open for other cultures we should try to avoid in the next generations by introducing the various cultures from the early years in childhood.

Dyab Abou Jahjah in 2008.

The Belgian-Lebanese Arab political activist and writer Dyab Abou Jahjah, claims that

‘hatred in Flanders is mainstream’

and

‘racism determines the agenda’.

When you follow certain reactions and talks it gives the impression not enough people want to react against that dangerous trend.

Christian people should let others know that all people have the same value because we are created by the same One True God. We all are being allowed to live on this globe and are given talents which can be used to help others. All people in a community have to complement each other.
Each person should know that racism devalues people. Non believers should come to see that Christ has broken down racial doors and overcomes divisive thinking by creating for himself a new nation through his death and resurrection. Every Christian should help to build a loving world by showing his love for others, be them of no believe or any other believe than Christianity.
When the politicians are not doing their job properly to build a multicultural peaceful state, the Christians needs to lead the way.
When you are a Christian do not wait until it is too late!

Let your voice be heard and speak up for the weaker ones in our society and for those who humiliated and shut out.

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Preceding articles

What is important?

Enough with the Clothes Shaming of Muslim Women

Anti-Semitic pressure driving Jews out of Europe

The Mountain: Radical Love

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Additional reading

1. Vliegend spaghettimonster en Gelijke behandeling voor elke overtuiging
2. Parenthood made more difficult
3. Uncertainty, shame and no time for vacillation
4. Migrants to the West #2
5. On French beach French police forces woman to undress in public
6. Pew Research: How People in Muslim Countries Believe Women Should Dress
7. Allowing dress code according liberty of religion
8. Coverings Worn by Muslim Women
9. The Dress Code for Women in the Quran
10. Meditating Muslimah on “hijab to be a religious obligation”
11. French showing to the whole world their fear and weakness
12. Christians, secularism, morals and values
13. Trusting present youngsters who are not necessary evil
14. Overprotection and making youngsters drifting away
15. Today’s thought “And he counted it to him for righteousness” (January 12)
16. Listening to the lessons of the Bible and looking for ways to please God

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Related

1. Hijab 1
2. Hijab 2
3. The Meaning of Hijab
4. I Tried Wearing a Hijab (sort of)
5. The hijab of ignorance
6. Cultural Bias
7. An Imagined Offence
8. The Irony of Hijabs!!
9. Transition: My Hijab Story
10. Hijab: Oppression or Freedom?
11. Hijab in Islam and other religions
12. Hijab | Zanzibar, Tanzania
13. Women unite for World Hijab Day, which is Today
14. Happy World Hijab Day 2018!
15. Pearls and swines – loose priorities – the hijab-saga in perspective
16. Hidden Pearl Hijab Review
17. Hijab ‘Attack’ Condemned By Canada’s Prime Minister Was A Hoax
18. My Hijab Story
19. The Secret Hijabi
20. What My Hijab Means To Me
21. Perspective: Hijab is Oppression or Freedom?Newspeak and the politics of fear

Freedom. To dispose of what is surplus.

Full summer.
The season of juicy fruit.
The land gives, we reap and enjoy.
The season of sharing, sharing what is abundant on the bushes.
Sharing what we can do without.

Full summer.
Is filling ourselves with sunlight.
Recharge our batteries, new energy.
The air and the light give, we reap and enjoy.
And then we share. We share what we can do without.

Because that is freedom.
To choose to share.
To give away what is surplus.
To get rid of the unnecessary.

Nederlandse versie: Vrijheid. Wegdoen wat overbodig is

…

The Open Share icon conveys the act of sharing by visually representing one hand passing an object to another hand, as in “pass it on” or “sharing”. The icon also represents an “eye”, as in “look at this”. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Picking up suitcases of pride

“Every woman that finally figured out her worth,
has picked up her suitcases of pride
and boarded a flight to freedom,
which landed in the valley of change.”
― Shannon L. Alder

Dutch version / Nederlandse versie > Koffers van trots inpakken en wegwezen

you can’t wake a person that is pretending to be asleep

To remember

• Learning to love parts of me that no one claps for. (Rudy Francisco)
• Listening to myself > carrying a lot of unspoken stress.
• Environment allowed to silence inner voice.
• Want to feel that I am living the best life possible.
• Did not give appropriate attention to blind spots in my life =>area where a person’s view is obstructed.
• re-examine my life … again …
• We think we are safe in the bubble => we actually put ourselves in danger by becoming powerless.
• group mentality doesn’t really offer fertile ground for creativity.
• responsible for own moral + ethical landscape.
• search for your blind spots
• Examine your environment + ask hard questions
• Freedom comes when we speak the truth. Even if our voices shake.
• When truth revealed >  blind spot = weak spot.

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heart prints

I am still learning to love the parts of me that no one claps for.
(Rudy Francisco)

I was listening to myself speak lately and I realised that I was carrying a lot of unspoken stress. The emotions that I felt caught me completely off guard and I wondered why I allowed my environment to silence my inner voice.
I want to feel that I am living the best life possible.
I want to think that I am comfortable with my choices and that they are intentional.
I want to believe that I learned from previous mistakes and experiences.
I want people to experience me as a free spirit with an eclectic view on life.
Newsflash …!
I am so comfortable inside my own identity that I did not give appropriate attention to the blind spots in my life.

Blind spot: an area where a person’s view is obstructed.
“the…

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Life Is A Marathon

Orlando Espinosa, a former educator, signed up to have an amazing life, regardless of the obstacles he may have to face. He is convinced that

Having a positive attitude is the key and moving forward is essential!

He has blog has some great images on his blog and offers a lot of pictures we all remember well from childhood. For him

Life is an amazing journey, too often taken for granted! It’s great being able to enjoy the simple things it offers! It feels great to be alive with a purpose!

Though in order to keep the momentum going in our life we shall need to maintain the pace, energy and enthusiasm from when we  first started! {Keep the Momentum} But we should be fully ware that we may not back down! {Don’t Back Down}. Always we should be prepared to believe in ourselves.

 

There has to come a point in life when you need to believe in who you are and what you have to offer.

Believing in yourself is one the key to achieving success in life.

You have to do what you want because there’s no one who can stand in your place.

You have to know that you are so much better than what they say…

If someone says you can’t do anything, don’t believe them, let it be a driving force to prove them wrong.

Be confident!

Get to know yourself and grow with new experiences.

Don’t be held back by a “fear”.

Don’t let people knock you down with their words of doubt! {Believe}

 

 

Defining what we value begins by recognizing who we value. {The Journey!}

He also warns not to

allow others to hold you captive because you don’t know what freedom feels like!
Some people feel the need to imprison others with their words and by their actions!

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Orlando Espinosa

Life isn’t a sprint, but a marathon! In order to finish a marathon you need stamina and consistency: you will need to hold a steady pace in order to cross the finish line!

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powerless

The Beginning

We build our own prisons, and carry them around. We bang our heads against heavy bars, and silently cry out for help. Some manipulative moves force us to our knees and we become immovable objects, trapped in the misery of our circumstance.

I felt like a caged bird. Trapped. Powerless.

What does it mean to be powerless? According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the definition of powerless is “without power, strength, or ability; wholly unable to act, influence, etc; helpless, impotent.”

Powerlessness implies a lack of control, yet we hold on to our false power and try to control our hurts. We bury the truth with denial and if that doesn’t pay off, we rationalize. If nothing works, we start the blaming game, losing precious energy, trying to escape our reality. Our lives become unmanageable. Resentments fester and grow like an emotional cancer.

Pity me O LORD, for I am weak. Heal me for my body is sick, and I am upset and disturbed. My mind is filled with apprehension and gloom. (Psalm 6:2-3, TLB)

I felt ashamed.

Problems far too big for me to solve are piled higher than my head. Meanwhile my sins, too many to count, have all caught up with me and I am ashamed to look up. (Psalm 40:12, TLB)

Whatever is covered up will be uncovered, and every secret will be made known. So then, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in broad daylight. (Luke 12:2-3, GNB)

I have no idea where you find yourself today. Perhaps you suffered from physical or emotional abuse; perhaps you had to suffer the consequences of having an alcoholic parent; perhaps you made horrible choices; perhaps you were subjected to verbal abuse or drugs; perhaps you had an abortion, or felt the shame of a teenage pregnancy; perhaps you experienced severe rejection by an absent parent or a painful divorce. The fact is, if you find yourself in a cage today, you need to re-examine your life.

Women lose their lives because they don’t realize that they can do things differently. If you stay in the cage too long, you become accustomed to the bars. Your powerlessness becomes your comfort zone. You wait for some external influence to change your situation. If nothing spectacular happens, you become angry and bitter. Unknowingly, you repeat the old family patterns and before long your children suffer the consequence of your ignorance. We lose respect for ourselves and our confidence disappears. How can we expect other people to respect us if we are deaf to our own inner voice?

The most common reason we stumble into the delusion of powerlessness is that we’re afraid of what other people would do, or say, or feel, if we were to act as we wanted. (Martha Beck)

The Middle…

I knew I had to let it go.

I had to let my carefully constructed life go.

I had to accept the truth of my situation and start the process of healing.

I had to identify each and every false structure in my life;

carefully examine the premise of each argument.

I had to be honest with myself first.

I needed a baseline from where I could present my case to the Lord.

I had to sacrifice the self-life.

I had to sacrifice the person that I have become while I was left to my own devices.

I had to empty myself.

I had to give God space to come in and begin His healing work.

I had to confess that I felt powerless,

that I needed God’s help.

They cried to the Lord in their troubles, and He rescued them! He led them from the darkness and shadow of death and snapped their chains. (Psalm 146:7, TLB)

He frees the prisoners … He lifts the burdens from those bent down beneath their loads. (Psalm 107:13-14, TLB)

I had to find the courage…

I had to settle in my own skin and stay there.

I had to find peace.

I had to let go of everything that tried to rob me of my peace.

I had to learn how to breathe.

I had to learn the art of slowing down and returning to peace.

I had to learn that tears are not a sign of weakness.

Tears soften and open the heart.

If you just start moving, you will feel better. (Oprah Winfrey)

Real power is usually unspectacular, a simple setting aside of fear that allows love. It changes everything. (Martha Beck)

I had to believe that there is a better world out there.

I had to find the open door.

I had to identify my choices.

I had to change my attitude, no longer thinking of myself as a victim of circumstance.

I had to learn to consider my options.

Every freedom can be taken from man except one: the freedom to choose his attitude of mind in any circumstance. (Victor Frankl)

The doors are wide open – women should have the courage to walk through. (Frene Ginwala)

The End.

I was ready to sacrifice my heart,

To give up my comfort zone.

I released the fear, not because I had the courage, but because I knew I had to DO something.

Nothing made sense, and for the first time in my life I could not trust my dysfunctional thoughts.

In my loneliness I realized that I could no longer serve myself.

My desperation for God overshadowed my fear.

God’s presence in my life annihilated my pride.

He made me aware of His grace.

His mercy.

He made me aware of my true self.

I was still sitting in my cage.

I had a lot of work to do.

I had a magnitude of realities to face.

But something stirred inside;

I felt a freedom that I never experienced before.

When we connect to God, we have access to a never-ending source of power. If you are struggling to let it all go; if you have issues with trust, consider reading the following verses to encourage yourself:

The Lord is my helper and I am not afraid of anything that mere man can do to me. (Hebrews 13:6, TLB)

Where God’s love is, there is no fear, because God’s perfect love drives out fear. (1 John 4:18, NCV)

Offer yourselves as a living sacrifice to God, dedicated to His service and pleasing to Him…let God transform you inwardly by a complete change of your mind. (Romans 12:1-2, TEV)

No one can be a slave to two masters; he will hate one and love the other; he will be loyal to one and despise the other. (Matthew 6:24, GNB)

Pride ends in a fall, while humility brings honor. (Proverbs 29:23, TLB)

Don’t be anxious about tomorrow. God will take care of your tomorrow too. Live one day at a time. (Matthew 6:34, TLB)

Whoever clings to his life shall lose it, and whoever loses his life shall save it. (Luke 17:33, TLB)

A NEW Beginning…

When we gradually release the burden of our unexpressed grief, we can slowly move out of our past. If you acknowledge the truth of your life story, and you mourn for the little girl on the inside, God gives you the grace to re-parent yourself with gentleness, humour, love and respect. You can leave the cage, and savour it as a beautiful memory. You can even fly past it to thank God for rescuing you. God will open your wings, He will give you life, and you will receive JOY!

Know the truth, and the truth will set you free. (John 8:32)

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. (Isaiah 43:18)

No, dear brothers, I am still not all I should be but I am bringing all my energies to bear in this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead. (Philippians 3:13, TLB)

Pictures: Pinterest

 

Summer Daze

As a a twenty-something living in Metro-Detroit the Communication major/Broadcasting minor from Oakland University and a pretty big PR nerd, Briana Carlesimo from Bri Car, who enjoys travelling, taking/making lots of videos, listening to any and all types of music, and all social media, let us dream away on the sun-rays of Summer and on the sweet smell of cut grass.

When summertime and warm weather approach she wants to look at a few ways to spice up summer outfits and on Pinterest shows that she loves fashion. {Fashion Friday — The Classic Button Up}

She also seems to be in love with Instagram‘s Rocksbox willing to spend $19 a month to receive a little box filled with 3 pieces of so called ‘designer jewelry’ for what we would call fantasy jewels. Fact is some handy guys may have the customer to they could be worth somewhere around $200.

We wonder what really happens when a person has used or kept  them for several weeks/months if they really would send you a new box for not more money! {Fashion-Friday Rocksbox} (Perhaps she tells us about her experiences)

She does not know if it is because it’s summer or what, her feeling like some really great music has been coming out lately. {Music Monday Summer-vibes}

For sure she shall have to go into a ‘hot Summer” having to see all the troubles going on in both camps of the Republicans and Democrats or Left vs. Right or “I’m right, you’re wrong”. Though she loves when people are passionate about what they believe – that’s great – but if their passion takes them to the point of blindness to anybody else’s opinion other than theirr own, that’s where she has a problem. {Freedom}

She thinks

The point of having political parties in the United States was to give different people the opportunity to speak out and join others with the same beliefs. It’s quite an amazing opportunity to give to citizens – the right and freedom to choose what to say without any penalty for it. We were given a chance to join like-minded people, but it is not a death sentence to be all-or-nothing within a certain party.

So why, then, are we arguing with other people who have different opinions than us? Why are we getting into physical fights just because somebody else wants to speak or hold a rally or give their thoughts to a larger audience? Why does nobody know the meaning of “peaceful protest” anymore? We have some of the bravest men and women fighting every day to help us keep our freedom, and meanwhile, we’re back home fighting each other and taking that freedom away. {Freedom}

*

This summertime also find some moments to put all that political debate away and enjoy the way your skin feels in the morning when that first ray of sunshine lands across your arm and the warmth of the world engulfs your entire being.

The idea that the summer time is a time for happiness and adventures and explorations all because the bright sky and the colorful land blend together into a painting unlike any other season.

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Preceding articles

Library of Love

How the Story Ends

2016 Summer holiday

Holiday time reading time

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3. Yes, it’s that hot here.
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8. Vancouver: Five Recommendations
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15. day 1056 – softball action
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Bri Car

There’s something so incredible about these hot, summer days.

Being able to feel the heat and the sun radiating off of the objects around you.

Or the way your skin feels in the morning when that first ray of sunshine lands across your arm and the warmth of the world engulfs your entire being.

How sweetly the smell of freshly cut grass and the sound of birds chirping come together to create a feeling that every day presents a new opportunity to shine as brightly as the sun does.

The idea that the summer time is a time for happiness and adventures and explorations all because the bright sky and the colorful land blend together into a painting unlike any other season.

Or the appreciation of knowing these days may be rough but that they’re the worst of the best, and even then, we still know we’d rather be breathing in these moments…

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