Given that a tree is known by its fruit (Luke 6:44), a loving person ought to be known by works of love.
Some difficulties to this:
1) works of love have loving motives - but motives are not always visible
2) love (as opposed to work) is hard to see by those without it
3) many people console themselves with the (false) belief that love does not exist.
These difficulties do not negate the truth of Luke 6:44. The are simply my explanation of the fact that we are not in a position to attempt to judge others' works.
Other important notes regarding Christian Love:
- Christian Love is required to tie together the temporal and the eternal.
- Christian Love is the best defense against hypocrisy.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Liberals and the new bigotry
Those who hold contempt for liberals while upholding the value of liberty are no different than those who held contempt for African Americans while ostensibly upholding the value of equality.
The Declaration of Independence ( US of A )
Or did I miss something in one of those amendment thingys??
We hold these truths to be self–evident,
That all men are created equal,
That they are endowed by their Creator
with certain unalienable Rights,
That among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
The Declaration of Independence ( US of A )
Sunday, January 10, 2010
On Universal Health Coverage
To those who blindly reject health insurance as something that governments ought to provide their citizens - yes I'm referring to American Republicans - I challenge them to consider where they will get their health insurance for all the remaining days of their lives - not just today while they are young, and healthy and employed.
Even assuming they are one of the fortunate few who do manage to hold on to their existing coverage for life, do they believe that their insurance company will honor that policy in twenty years to the same extent and level of service that they did twenty years ago? Were they not among the same group of people that told those corporations to cut costs every single year? Were they not among those same people that held up the quarterly financial targets as the priority exceeding even the processing of certain health insurance claims?
It is not duplicity, or a double standard that makes them act this way. It is just blindness. Blindness to the fact that in the long run, they are in the same boat as those already needing government supplied health insurance coverage.
Until such a time as corporations return "doing the right thing" back to their corporate mandate in place of "meeting the quarterly targets", health coverage needs to be provided federally for all citizens of all countries.
Doing the right thing means looking at the individual as someone who needs care. Meeting the quarterly targets means looking at the individual as an additional expense to the bottom line. One is charitable and serves others and one is stingy and self serving. One is the goal of humanitarianism and one is the goal of capitalism; and only one will meet the health coverage needs of the citizens as opposed to the shareholders.
Even assuming they are one of the fortunate few who do manage to hold on to their existing coverage for life, do they believe that their insurance company will honor that policy in twenty years to the same extent and level of service that they did twenty years ago? Were they not among the same group of people that told those corporations to cut costs every single year? Were they not among those same people that held up the quarterly financial targets as the priority exceeding even the processing of certain health insurance claims?
It is not duplicity, or a double standard that makes them act this way. It is just blindness. Blindness to the fact that in the long run, they are in the same boat as those already needing government supplied health insurance coverage.
Until such a time as corporations return "doing the right thing" back to their corporate mandate in place of "meeting the quarterly targets", health coverage needs to be provided federally for all citizens of all countries.
Doing the right thing means looking at the individual as someone who needs care. Meeting the quarterly targets means looking at the individual as an additional expense to the bottom line. One is charitable and serves others and one is stingy and self serving. One is the goal of humanitarianism and one is the goal of capitalism; and only one will meet the health coverage needs of the citizens as opposed to the shareholders.
Friday, January 01, 2010
2010 - Resolutions
Why is it we seem to struggle so hard to come up with meaningful New Year Resolutions?
We want something not too trite, yet not too sacrificial either. Not something we've tried and failed before and not something that we already do. It can't be something that takes less effort to do than to resolve, like sponsoring a poor child in another country ( https://children.worldvision.ca/Sponsorship/Forms/Child.aspx )
What we want is something about us to change.
Most likely we'll resolve to change something we don't like; our weight, our job, our bank balance, our habits. We search the artificial pool of favourite New Years Resolutions hoping to find the one that with minimal effort will make us a better person.
My resolution for 2010 - to be a better person. Isn't that really what every one wants?
We want something not too trite, yet not too sacrificial either. Not something we've tried and failed before and not something that we already do. It can't be something that takes less effort to do than to resolve, like sponsoring a poor child in another country ( https://children.worldvision.ca/Sponsorship/Forms/Child.aspx )
What we want is something about us to change.
Most likely we'll resolve to change something we don't like; our weight, our job, our bank balance, our habits. We search the artificial pool of favourite New Years Resolutions hoping to find the one that with minimal effort will make us a better person.
My resolution for 2010 - to be a better person. Isn't that really what every one wants?
