GOOD FRIDAY!

"We are not free, separate, and independent entities, but like links in a chain, and we could not by any means be what we are without those who went before us and showed us the way." ~ Thomas Mann

Ironic. That I would be cooking a pork shoulder and ribs today, huh? Well not really if you dig deep into New Testament scripture, the Law being fulfilled, replaces all of those dietary codes. Good for us. Because Southerners could not live with out our Barbeque.

I was also, pondering this thought, most of my evangelical compadres would really have a hard time with the Biblical Jesus, since he was Jewish. And Liberal. Would he be a "New York Jew" or an "Elistist California Jew" or a "Zionist Jew"?

You know the Bible/Torah mentions being liberal many times and conservative only in a negative sense. Which is totally opposite the meaning today's conservatives apply to it.

Sorry! the word conserve doesn't occur in the KJV. Sorry! the word conservative doesn't occur in the KJV. Liberal occurs 6 times in 4 verses. (search courtesy of www.BlueLetterBible.org/)

Isa 32:5 The vile person shall be no more called liberal, nor the churl said [to be] bountiful. KJV or in plain English:
( The foolish person will no longer be called generous, Nor the miser said to be bountiful; New King James Version © 1982 Thomas Nelson )

"Little things affect little minds." ~ Benjamin Disraeli

Tomorrow is Good Friday

"Food for the body is not enough. There must be food for the soul." ~ Dorothy Day
If the weather continues to be nice, tomorrow will be a meat smoking day. Early the fire will start, heating the smoker to a nice temperature, before the meat goes on the fire. Depending on the prices at the stores I will be smoking a shoulder, ribs and chicken for the kids. We will be going to a Redbirds game on Saturday night, so they better get their act together before then. What can be better than Barbeque and baseball in the South?

So tomorrow as the smoke rises and the smell of hickory drifts around the house I'll just imagine the taste of the things to come.

"Every man has a right to be conceited until he is successful." ~ Benjamin Disraeli

"Toil, says the proverb, is the sire of fame." ~ Euripides, Greek tragedian

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The breeze is out of the South...

The weather is getting a little warmer and the senses are starting to draw me to the outdoors. I can almost smell the meat smoking on the grill and the hickory burning slowly. Spring and Summer yield an air temperature that allows us to cook out doors with much greater ease.

The fires do not have to be kept as hot to maintain internal temperature. Thank goodness.

We will soon be smoking meat....

"Welcome to Dixie. Please leave everything as you found it." ~ from a note left to the defense attorney in John Grisham’s The Chamber

"One of the sublimest things in the world is plain truth." ~ Edward Bulwer-Lytton

Why did the weather do what it did?

"The stench of corruption [from the White House] has grown so foul, that even the talking heads at Fox are finding it hard to fumigate their evening broadcast." ~ Jean Carnahan

"Fight for your opinions, but do not believe that they contain the whole truth, or the only truth." ~ Charles A. Dana

Sometimes we are so caught up in our own struggles we tend to forget the misfortunes of others. These past few weeks, the states of TN, AR, MO and parts of numerous other sections of other states have been struck with the force of violent storms dropping out of the sky.

Where are the talking heads now, speaking about the wrath of an omnipotent God and his disgust with the people that inhabit the vile areas around Marmaduke, AR and Gallatin, TN. It is because the self righteous find it much easier to raise alarm at big city problems, than the meth labs in trailers in rural southern communities and the abuse families suffer at the hands of overwork and alcohol. Racing on Sunday keeps as many people away from church as does ineffectual witnessing.

Nothing against the most popular sport in modern America, but beer, tight t-shirts, speed, loud engines and even louder mouth fans are not the evangelical's best friend. So why did all the open land in TX and OK burn, also? Same reasons that the hurricanes hit the gulf coast, maybe.

But more likely it is because they have had fewer years of constant rainfall in the last several than you could count and the policies of most conservatives don't plan for water conservation, only money conservation for the wealthy. Again the moral and ethics of Christians are in conflict with the policies of the politically conservative agenda and they stick with "Johnny two note" on only anti-abortion and the marriage amendment; when there are so many other issues that need their attention.

"Republicans were indifferent to the poor". ~ David Kuo, White House deputy director for faith-based initiatives for the George W. Bush administration

"Logic is the art of going wrong with confidence." ~ Morris Kline