GOD BLESS AMERICA

“While the storm clouds gather

Far across the sea

Let us pledge allegiance

To a land that’s free

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In 1938,  storm clouds blackened over Europe and spread with the rise of Germany’s dictator, Adolph Hitler. 

In America, the same year, with tension rising and the country divided about whether to stand with allies, songwriter Irving Berlin gave us “God Bless America,” a prayerful anthem for peace. Popular singer Kate Smith made it her signature song and Americans made it a hymn. 

“Let us all be grateful for a land so fair

As we raise our voices in a solemn prayer . . .”

Back then, America tried to avoid an escalating global war even as we watched Hitler ravage Europe, but when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in December, 1941, it became our war. It cost us more than 400,000 brave warriors and four years of conflict, but we won.

Today, the storm clouds gather again. Even to my naïve eye and non-political brain I know recent world events will have serious impact on America’s role and her future. Is another global war likely?

It depends on powerful leaders with short fuses and immense egos.

Here at home we have internal problems.

Division. Those who make laws and decisions for us can’t find common ground, so there are no solutions to:

Gun violence. Every day there’s a new story. Every day senseless lives lost.

Drugs. Too many are addicted. Too many die.

Increasing rise in the homeless and destitute. Many are veterans. Why?

Fear. We keep our children close to keep them safe from predators and dropped needles. We tuck concealed weapons in purses and pockets just in case. Our homes have security cameras and we lock our doors, even when we’re there. Strangers are not welcome and we look at anyone walking near our homes after dark with suspicion.

And probably in what should be the safest place anywhere — our schools — we have guards with guns and practice lockdowns, alert to the possibility of a school shooter.

“God Bless America.

Land that I love”

Do you think we’ve forgotten that our founding fathers built our country on Christian moral values? That if they found it necessary to include God in the building of our nation, it’s just as necessary to include Him today?

Stand beside her and guide her

Through the night with the light from above

Maybe it’s time to ask for wisdom for our country’s leaders, and blessings for our country.

From the mountains

To the prairies 

To the ocean white with foam

God Bless America

My home sweet home.”

 

 

 

passive cowardice

I am a coward. Worse, I am a passive coward. Not only do I not speak out when injustice happens, but I let the injustice slide on by and drift into the “can’t do anything about it anyway” bin.

Not this time.

Another school shooting happened this week, not, what? little more than a week from the last one? This time it happened in a Maryland school. A kid shooting at kids. Yeah, it was only one kid who got killed. Yes, one other student got hit by gunfire. Good that the officer on duty stopped the shooter before others were hurt or killed. It was still traumatic, senseless, and left more grieving parents and families to wonder why, more school officials wondering how to make their school safe. (Not safer. SAFE.)

Ho Hum. Another day at the school lottery firing range.

When is it enough?

When do the adults in this country do what we’ve watched our young ones do? When do we start kicking and screaming and pointing fingers and demanding that something be done to stop this?

Someone said to me the other day, “Nobody in Washington will do anything to move a solution forward until one of their own is shot or killed.”

Seriously???

We’re waiting for the right kid(s) to become targets so somebody will do something?

Pathetic!

And this is even more pathetic. When the young people started their movement, calling attention to their own need to feel safe, what did this coward do?

I sat on my comfortable sofa in my comfortable living room, drink beside me, and applauded these brave young lads and lassies. I applauded these male and female Davids going against the unmoving, unbending, locked into place Goliaths in Congress. And I cried. I cried because I’m not smart enough, wise enough, courageous enough, energetic enough, to join them. To yell, No More. And I prayed. I prayed for the dead, the wounded in spirit as well as body, and I asked God to let it end.

He told me this was our task. He said He would help if we asked for His help, but that we had pretty much forgotten about Him and He also reminded me that the mess we’re in is the mess we created.

I have no idea if making twenty-one the legal age to buy guns, or outlawing the sale of the super weapons and bump stocks to general public or doing extensive background checks or any of the other suggested possibilities will help. But it is a place to start. Doing nothing is just that. Nothing. And the way I see it, there are way too many people sitting in the hallowed halls of Congress doing that. And the ball really is in their court.

There have to be national standards regulating guns. Guns kill. Don’t feed me that stupidity about it’s people with guns who kill. That is a true statement. But if the people who would do harm to other people had a harder time getting the guns they would use to kill, there would be far less killing. Guns kill. They kill because they were made to do just that, whether for hunting bear or hunting students. They kill.

While I’m on the soapbox here, let me say the idea of arming classroom teachers is about the dumbest idea I’ve heard. I come from a family of teachers, and I can’t imagine any one of them ever becoming a pistol packin’ mama or papa. I realize it only takes one good shot to take down an aggressor, but I wonder how many semi-trained teachers could fire that one good shot?

Last thing: I’m not writing this to start an argument with anyone. I’m writing this because something has gone terribly wrong in our beautiful world and I want us to do something about it. I do believe prayer is a good place to start. God not only loves us, He listens, and if we ask for His help, He’ll give it, in ways I can’t begin to imagine. He’s God. He’ll figure it out.

And I’m really tired of being a passive coward.

 

 

THIS LITTLE LIGHT OF MINE

I’ll say it up front. This blog is all about God.

During this season of Lent, I made a resolution to begin each day with Dynamic Catholic.com.
It’s a website hosted by Matthew Kelly, the inspired head of the Dynamic Catholic organization, and it offers a question or statement each of the forty days of Lent about who we are, what we want, our values, and our role in life, all in relation to God’s plan for us.

Recently, Matthew asked the question, “Why do we complicate things?”

 It isn’t a simple question. It’s all tied up in who we think we are, what we think we should be doing, and most important, what, really, are we here for?

Right now, this minute, I don’t have answers. I want to know what God wants me to do. I want to be the person he wants me to be and I want to know that I am alive for a reason.

I know the Catholic catechism clearly spells it out. We’re here to know, love, and serve God. Easy?

No. Complicated. We live in a materialistic world , a world of “me,” where it’s too tempting to ride the wave of more instead of enough. God gets pushed aside so we can exercise that little freedom to choose thing and what’s easy is forgetting that we each have a purpose in life, that God always has his eyes on us, that he loves us unconditionally and that, if asked, he’ll guide us through the maze of life.

I like simple. I like the idea of God being in charge. It’s actually a relief. Thing is, liking it, wanting it to happen and letting it happen are different. See? Complicated. But I’ll keep listening for the Voice that guides and one of these mornings when I’m watching the shadows give way to the sun and thinking about whatever God question Matthew Kelly asks me to think about, I might see the light, no, feel the light, God’s light, shine into me and radiate out, so it might touch others.

Wouldn’t it be something if we allowed God’s light to fill us up and spill into those around us so it multiplies thousands of times?

Now that would be uncomplicated.